MILAN, Italy -- It's a sunny afternoon as former Manchester United and Serbia captain Nemanja Vidic meets ESPN FC by the statue of composer Giuseppe Verdi near his Milan home, not far from San Siro.
"I know a good place," says the 35-year-old of a local bar that specialises in wine, cheese and ham. "I like cheese a lot; you have to have cheese with every meal."
Vidic orders one of the indulgences he's allowed himself since retiring in January 2016 and we begin to talk.
ESPN FC: What are you up to these days?
Nemanja Vidic: I stayed in Milan after I retired last year. I like it here. The food is good, the wine, too. You need to know about wine if you're going to be a football manager; it's what they talk about after games.
I wanted to enjoy life a little after a long football career, so I've played golf -- I play off [a handicap of] six -- a bit of tennis and I've done some travelling. I've started skiing and I have strong legs so I'm OK at that. I've done the things I couldn't do when I played.
Milan is a good location for now and Italian is not a bad language to learn. My Italian should be better, but I can speak it. As you learn a language when you're older, you're scared to make mistakes. When you're young you don't care. My three boys, who were all born in Manchester, are 10, 8 and 5 and speak better Italian than me. I want to improve my Spanish, too.
After a rest, I want to go back into football so I'm changing my mentality from enjoyment to preparing for my future. I've been doing my professional licence with the English FA. It's difficult, but it's a good course and managers including Gareth Southgate and Mauricio Pochettino have been to see us. They were great, really honest.
Nicky Butt, David James, Nigel Clough and Warren Joyce are on the course, plus several others. I feel like they want to us to be the very best managers we can be. We learn about our strengths and weaknesses. I'm learning and not rushing. I played at a high level and feel fine with the football side. But I didn't know all I should about the other side of things you need to think about as a manager; the media, the responsibility for all the players, the psychology of leadership.
ESPN FC: Sir Alex Ferguson said you always said "sorry, gaffer" in training because you trained like you played and you went in hard.
Vidic: I always said sorry if I hit the player. I didn't hurt them on purpose; I was playing my natural game, even in training. I didn't want anyone to score against me so I didn't go easy. Plus, I had to deal with players who were too fast. Sometimes I'd miss them. [Cristiano] Ronaldo was so fast, [Wayne] Rooney too when he was younger. Louis Saha was really quick. Ryan Giggs was especially quick over a short distance.
I had to stop them and we trained to such a high standard that it helped me improve a lot. And those players I was up against knew that they weren't going to pass me easily. The ball or the player might get past me, but not both!
ESPN FC: Why did your partnership with Rio Ferdinand work so well?
Vidic: We were very different as players and characters. He was on social media before most players and would say to me: "Come on social media, you'll enjoy it." I said no. It was not for me, but Rio really enjoyed speaking to the fans and sharing his opinions. I cannot be like him, but I like him.
In matches, Rio enjoyed playing from the back and going forward with the ball. He was a classy player; I was the opposite. I like to defend. We helped each other a lot and the partnership really worked.
Rio really helped me settle when I came to the club, checking if I was ok and taking me out a few times. Once, we went into Manchester for a night out. It's not something I did often, but Rio and I went out and we bumped into Dwight Yorke.
I don't think he knew who I was, but when I was young I loved that partnership between Yorke and Andrew Cole. I told Dwight that night that they had the best partnership in the world for two years. He must have thought that I was a fan!
ESPN FC: So you watched United's 1999 treble winners?
Vidic: I loved watching Cole and Yorke. They were always smiling and scoring goals. I loved their energy and I watched strikers more than defenders when I was young. I watched Italian football when I was younger and liked Parma a lot with [Faustino] Asprilla and [Hernan] Crespo. Fiorentina had two excellent forwards with Gabriel Batistuta and Rui Costa.
ESPN FC: And before that? Did you support the Red Star Belgrade team that won the 1991 European Cup?
Vidic: I was 10, I remember clearly. I could name the whole team; football was my life. My town was 200 kilometres from Belgrade but there were lots of Red Star fans -- and Partisan fans -- where I lived. It was my dream to play for Red Star and I loved the forwards: [Darko] Pancev, [Robert] Prosinecki, [Dejan] Savicevic, [Vladimir] Jugovic.
Red Star went to Bayern Munich in the semifinal and won 2-1. What a game. Then they drew at home: 2-2. I recorded the game on a video and watched it so many times that my father was getting crazy because he couldn't watch any movies!
Red Star then played Olympique Marseille in Bari in the final. They didn't play well, but won and were champions of Europe. That couldn't happen now in Serbian football. A great success now is reaching the Champions League. Serbia still produces very good footballers, though.
ESPN FC: You lived through difficult times. You lived through war.
Vidic: I was in Belgrade with Red Star in 1999 and we knew that the bombs were coming a day or two before. I heard the sirens; it was not pleasant. Football stopped and I waited one night during the bombs and then went to my home town for two months.
It was very sad. Buildings in my home town and Belgrade were hit. They took out the strategic targets but they were in the centre: The telecommunications centre that was 200 metres from my home. I heard the big crash in the day. Nobody died, thankfully. My dad was not far away and I was outside the town. I called Dad to check he was OK and he was. I was young, 18, and only thinking about myself and tomorrow. If it happened now I would be terrified, being a parent.
ESPN FC: You'd been captain of a Red Star team that had won the domestic double and then earned a big move to Spartak Moscow in 2004.
Vidic: That was a dream achieved by the age of 21. I played four very good years at Red Star. I scored the winner in a derby against Partisan away. I wanted to run and jump into where our fans were, but they were at the other end to where I scored.
My friend Vladimir Dimitrijevic had just died and I was wearing his shirt. We'd joined Red Star at 15 and he had a heart attack on the pitch in training when he was 20. I saw the ambulance come and went to hospital with him.
We were inseparable, really close friends, like brothers away from home. We had the same dreams. And then he died. I'm still in touch with his parents. They're proud of their son; he was a good person and a very good player. He had a similar talent level to me and a big future ahead of him.
ESPN FC: Why did you move to Moscow?
Vidic: I needed a new challenge, I wanted to improve. I had a chance to move to Italy, but Red Star didn't accept the offer. The Russian league was stronger than the Serbian league so it was a step forward. Russia and Serbia have strong cultural connections; there were other Serbian players there and that helped me settle. I played for one-and-a-half years. It was just what I needed, better than going straight to England.
ESPN FC: And then Liverpool came in for you?
Vidic: Yes, I spoke my few words of English to Rafa Benitez: "Hi, how are you?" "Thank you." But my wife spoke English and spoke to Liverpool. They were interested in me and then it went quiet for a few weeks.
In the meantime, Man United came for me. I had a choice between the two. Fergie called me and a friend of mine spoke to him. For the only time ever, Fergie spoke really slowly to me. I understood a few words. He said he liked me, where he'd watched me, where he wanted me to play. He was precise and clear. United moved quickly and everything was done in three days.
Fergie collected me from the Lowry hotel when I arrived in Manchester and took me to the Radisson where the players stayed then. I sat on a table with Louis Saha, Cristiano Ronaldo and Mikael Silvestre. They were friendly but I really struggled at first at United.
ESPN FC: It can't have been easy joining halfway through the season, in January 2006, when your own season had finished?
Vidic: The United lads had played six months; I'd not even done a preseason. I was not fit and I found it difficult physically. I was not strong enough, not powerful enough and I'd not played a type of football where there was so much contact. So it was hard as I adapted for six months. Patrice Evra joined at the same time as me. We were not ready to play for United, both physically and in terms of experience. Training was hard for us; it was cold.
ESPN FC: But you came from Moscow!
Vidic: The Russian season finished in November, then we had one-and-a-half months off. The preseason is in the sun in Turkey. It wasn't bad and even when it was cold you had bright sunny days. Manchester had the low clouds.
Sir Alex sent us to play for the reserves at Blackburn. We played 45 minutes when the manager Rene Muelensteen took us off saying: "Enough!" Patrice and I showered and said: "What have we done coming here? It's going to be difficult for us." People were saying: "Who are these guys? If they can't play for the reserves, how can they play for the first team?" It was a really tough time, but we worked hard, improved and established ourselves. It was a good lesson for us, the start. You have to work hard in life.
ESPN FC: You broke into the team and won the League Cup.
Vidic: I adapted and I was fine from the preseason in the following season. We didn't have a big squad and there was a transition going on. There were times when the fans were not happy about the way we played; they'd waited a few years without a trophy. Me, Patrice and Michael Carrick had arrived that year. Carrick was underrated; the connection between us and the forwards, someone who brought balance. He's a good character for the club and the team, someone who never put himself in front of the group. Ronaldo and Rooney were maturing, Rio, too.
ESPN FC: Maturing into a side that won the Premier League in 2007 and then again a year later -- along with the Champions League in 2008 -- with Cristiano Ronaldo the best player in Europe.
Vidic: Cristiano was visibly improving by the week and I know because I was playing against him every day. I improved playing against him. If he beat me, I'd see it as a challenge not to be beaten by him the next time. I learned, he learned.
He trained hard and stayed behind after to practice his skills with his left and right foot. People think his talent came naturally, but he really worked hard to get where he is, worked hard at everything. Look at his body now; he was skinny when he came to United. He's hardly had any injuries either, yet he trained at full level.
ESPN FC: Can you remember Paul Pogba joining the United first team for training?
Vidic: Paul was only 17 and already as physically strong as he is now, with a very good physique. Paul Scholes would kick him and test him, just as he did when I arrived. Scholes was showing the will to win, showing that we were not friends kicking the ball about, but that we trained tough and strong, as if we were in matches. It was: "You kick me and I kick you." We fought every day and didn't need to switch on for a game because we were always switched on.
United had a lot of players like that, who were so competitive. That meant we were better prepared, even more than some of the best teams, who had great players but not the same drive to win. We'd go to games in Europe, or to Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool and not fear anybody. We went to Barcelona in the Champions League semifinal and didn't fear them one bit. We were Man United, ready for anyone. If they wanted to fight we'd fight. If they wanted to play we'd play.
ESPN FC: In that semifinal with Barcelona, Scholes scored the tie's only goal.
Vidic: Paul had good vision. The most difficult thing in football is to play simple but Paul managed to do that. He saw the opportunities before the ball came; he played fast and with one or two touches. If he had the chance to shoot, he shot. His pass completion was about 85 percent, which is crazy for a midfielder, but he was taking risks and playing the ball forward, not playing it square. He had a great long ball and a great strike. Like against Barcelona in the semifinal. The fans used to sing: "Paul Scholes, he scores goals."
ESPN FC: Did you like your song? "Nemanja, wooah, he comes from Serbia, he'll f------ murder yer!"
Vidic: I loved it. It doesn't offend me. It showed the fans respected me and what I was doing. I didn't know it was me when they first sang it; I was so focused on the game. Someone asked me if I'd heard the song. I asked them what the fans had song and he replied: "Well, it's a bit tough."
Of course I'm not a murderer and nor are Serbian people, but I appreciated fans singing for me. It was a great song and I had a good relationship with United fans. They're patient. I came from countries where the fans boo if you don't win after three games. In Manchester, they hadn't won in two or three years and they remained very supportive.
They even sing for their old players and even when they lose. We lost one of my first games against Blackburn and I was devastated. I walked to the dressing room but the fans shouted our names and I was told to say thank you to them. I was embarrassed to say thank you because we didn't perform. The support was often better at away games; they'd never stop singing. The players need that, need someone to push them further than even they think they can go.
ESPN FC: You can't go much further than United being English, European and world champions, as you were in 2008.
Vidic: Moscow [venue of the 2008 Champions League final] was so special for me because I'd lived there and it was at the home of my old club, yet I didn't know whether I was going to play in the game or not. I was injured for two weeks before and trained for the first time the night before the game. Fergie came up to me and said: "How are you feeling?"
"I'm OK," I replied.
"Can you play tomorrow?"
"Yes."
"Then you play tomorrow."
It sounds simple but I was not sure. I'd not played for two weeks, the pitch was heavy and it wasn't like it was a friendly; it was the Champions League final. I had an injection for the pain in my calf, a strong pain killer. I also had lots of adrenaline.
ESPN FC: You also had a disagreement with Didier Drogba, which led to him being sent off.
Vidic: [Smiles] I've forgotten about it. Maybe I was concussed.
ESPN FC: Come on.
Vidic: He wanted to punch me, he reacted. At first I was thinking: "What is he doing?" Then I went towards him. I was stupid, so was he. I've never spoken to him since about it. What is there to say apart from that I won the Champions League that night!
ESPN FC: What would you say to a player thinking of moving to Manchester?
Vidic: The weather is not great -- it's those damp, low clouds rather than the rain -- and you have to adjust, but I was there for nine years. I liked it and so did my family. It's safe, the people are friendly.
I loved the football there and the weather was perfect for it, the best possible conditions. It rains just enough for the pitch to be fast and open your lungs. Try doing that in the summer in Italy or Spain.
And United is the best club you can play at, which is obviously a factor. You get to spend more time with your family than at other clubs because so many of the games are close to Manchester.
ESPN FC: The Manchester derby grew in importance while you were at United.
Vidic: I'd just arrived in Manchester and we lost at City. I didn't play, but we lost. It was tough and the dressing room was a quiet place after the game.
City's money changed the derby. They bought [Emmanuel] Adebayor, then they bought [Sergio] Aguero and [David] Silva. Big money, great players. City didn't compete for the title when I arrived. They won it before I left.
They signed [Carlos] Tevez, a good player. He didn't work hard in training but always gave 100 percent in the game. He scored important goals for United. We shouldn't forget them. He was good for the team, good in the dressing room. He won the European Cup with us.
I wasn't happy when he moved to City, I didn't agree with what he did and I didn't want to lose him as a teammate. I knew I'd be marking him too, but I didn't speak to him when I did. I wouldn't even speak to my brother on the pitch, it's best kept professional. But after I would say: "Hi, Carlos, how are you doing?" I couldn't ignore him; we'd won everything together.
ESPN FC: Drogba, Aguero, Luis Suarez or Fernando Torres -- who was the toughest to play against?
Vidic: Drogba would be at you for the full game. He played for the team that pushed us more than any other. It was hard against him, especially at Stamford Bridge which is a smaller pitch. He was always around the box where he was best.
Torres always created a chance to score, but Drogba was on you for the full game. People say to me: "You had a difficult game against Torres," but it was just the one game and the story has grown. I went to head the ball but changed my mind and tried to pass to Edwin Van der Sar. I misjudged the distance. Torres was in a better position and scored. He scored a few against us.
I prepared myself for every game thinking: "I'm up against the best player in the world today" and never underestimated anyone. Adebayor was very good for six months; Robin van Persie was hard to play against too. He'd chop and shoot with his left foot. [Emile] Heskey, Victor Anichebe; lots of hard players in England.
ESPN FC: And in Europe. Like Lionel Messi. Twice, in Champions League finals.
Vidic: They were my biggest disappointments, especially the first one in Rome. It was us or Barcelona, who were going to create a legacy. The media were praising Barcelona for their football and asking: "Are Man United going to play football or counter-attack?"
ESPN FC: For the first nine minutes United played football. They started well.
Vidic: Yes, we missed two chances and then they half counter-attacked and scored. In that moment the game changed because they're good in possession. They played without a striker and scored early on. That wasn't good for us. Psychologically we were not strong enough. Mentally we were not strong enough to take the game to them.
ESPN FC: But you were the European and world champions.
Vidic: [Shakes head] I know, I know. And we played Barca at Wembley two years later, but the game in Rome is the one which frustrates more.
ESPN FC: How did it feel to become United captain?
Vidic: Gary Neville was injured and couldn't play in matches. We needed a captain on the pitch. We had leaders in the dressing room: Gary, Giggs, Scholes, Rooney, Rio, Patrice. No shortage of leaders. It wasn't easy for me to become captain but I didn't change much and I had all the players around me, which I needed.
ESPN FC: Did that team need changing so much after Ferguson left?
Vidic: We'd won the Premier League.
ESPN FC: Was it a weaker league than now? Jose Mourinho thinks it was.
Vidic: I don't care if it was or wasn't, we won the league. Again. What more could we do? Did we need to change? That was up to the manager. But when I go into management, I think it's really important that you get the best out of the players. David [Moyes] didn't get the best out of us and we didn't get the best out of him.
The situation was sad and the subsequent management changes have shown that the United job is very, very difficult after the man who ran the club, the players, the media and everything left, but the quality in general was there. I was desperate for us to be a success under David, to help him, to win again. It didn't happen. But it'll happen again for United. They'll be back.