Manchester City fan Liam Broady excited about presence of Erling Haaland, calls him one of the biggest stars after Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo
British tennis player Liam Broady is excited to have football superstar Erling Haaland play for Manchester City, his favorite football team.
Broady hails from Stockport, Greater Manchester and is a devoted fan of Manchester City. In an interview with Clay Tenis, Broady spoke about how Haaland has managed to replace all-time fan favorite Sergio Aguero to an extent by exceeding everyone's expectations.
"Mbappe and Haaland are the next superstars after Cristiano and Messi, so having one of them, for a ManCity fan is so strange: an amazing feeling and very exciting. Similar with (Sergio) Aguero, but we didn’t expect him to be as good as he became," he said.
Broady also stated that he feels sad for Aguero as he didn't win the Champions League trophy during his time with Manchester City.
The Argentine striker even missed out on winning the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar last year, having retired from the sport earlier in the year.
"Such a shame because he never won the champions league with Man City. He deserved it," he added. "An incredible player, one of the best strikers, ever in the Premier League. And then Argentina winning the World Cup. He would have been in the team, obviously if his heart was ok. I’m sure he still feels he belongs to the team."
Haaland has had a fantastic start to his Manchester City career. In his 41 appearances for the Cityzens, he has scored 48 goals and picked up five assists.
Liam Broady shuns nightlife in search of tennis success
Liam Broady had an excellent junior career, reaching the finals of the Wimbledon Championships in 2011 and the US Open in 2012. He won two Grand Slams in the junior boys doubles category at Wimbledon (2010) and Australian Open (2012), which helped him reach a career-high ranking of No. 2 in the junior world rankings.
However, that form hasn't translated into his senior career as he has failed to break into the top 100 ATP world rankings so far. He reached a career-high ranking of World No. 116 on February 14 last year and is currently ranked No. 132.
Broady stated that the turning point in his performances happened in 2019 when he decided to give up on his nightlife to focus more on his game.
"When I was younger, I didn’t progress as much as I wanted to as a player, because I spent too much time in the clubs and in the bars in Manchester and in around the world," he said.
Once his focus shifted to tennis completely, he began registering good results across tournaments. He reached the finals of a couple of Challenger tournaments in 2019.
The 29-year-old is yet to take part in the main round action at the US Open, though he has competed at the other three Majors — Wimbledon (2015, 2016, 2018, 2021, 2022), French Open (2020) and Australian Open (2022). He also represented Great Britain at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
Broady was recently in action at the Srpska Open in Banja Luka, where he lost to Damir Dzumhur in the opening round after entering the main draw through the qualifiers.