Yet at United he's a different prospect, lacking confidence and perhaps getting affected by supporters increasingly getting on his back. The worry is United is perhaps too big a club for Nani to develop, in the shadow of another certain recently-departed Portuguese winger.

Perhaps Rio is pointing to Ferguson's next sale!

It's always interesting to watch a player's career grow. I remember picking up the Guardian's sport page on Saturday and reading that Ferguson had bought two unknown players called Nani and Anderson. He had also splashed out on Owen Hargreaves on the same day, which meant his summer spending was over in the first week of the transfer window. Anyway, he has always been a bit of a weird one for me, as I can never work out who he wants to be. He can be a creative genius one minute and then a complete idiot the next.

However he just cannot seem to playe well against the big boys (or get a chance for that matter), which isn't necessarily a bad thing, as there wasn;t a certain Portuguese winger for Man Utd, who was often slated for not performing against the big boys.