Rio Ferdinand says he is ‘gutted’ at the way Manchester United have treated former teammate and makes Benzema point

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Rio Ferdinand has hit out at Manchester United for the club’s poor handling of David de Gea’s contract situation.

The goalkeeper’s current deal expires today (June 30) and there is a lack of clarity over whether he will stay at the club or not.

The Telegraph reports David de Gea has ‘no idea’ if he will stay or not, with Manchester United keeping options open.

While many feel De Gea has passed his sell-by-date and should be released, Manchester United have kept him hanging.

READ: Confirmed Manchester United transfers in, out, loans, releases, youth for 2023/24

Rio Ferdinand on David de Gea

Earlier this week we labelled United ‘classless’ for the way they had handled De Gea’s contract, failing to give the goalkeeper clarity on his future.

De Gea is among the club’s top 20 appearance makers of all time, a Manchester United player since June 2011.

Speaking to his YouTube channel, Rio Ferdinand expressed his sadness at the way his former title-winning teammate has been treated.

He said: “I am just a little bit gutted to be honest with you the way the club have handled the David de Gea situation. Again I think it comes down to communication.

“When you’ve got big players leaving the football club, Man United need to learn from this because they’ve made mistakes in the past.

“You want the players that have serve the club well to leave with a nice taste in their mouth, disappointed they’ve got to leave, because no one wants to leave the club they’ve grown to love. But [there’s] a sour taste they leave with sometimes, it ain’t right.”

Ferdinand added that David de Gea will not have seen this coming, and does not see how he could possibly stay put at Old Trafford.

“You owe it to a player who has been there that long to leave on half-decent terms at least. He will be sitting there David thinking, ‘wow man I never ever dreamed that I would leave the football club in this way, in this manner.’

“I look at it now and think how does David de Gea stay?”

Other clubs do it better

Rio Ferdinand pointed out the way Real Madrid handle the departures of their long-serving players, including Casemiro last summer. Karim Benzema was the latest example to get a presentation and special goodbye.

He said: “The way players who have been at Real Madrid leave, you look the other day at Benzema the way he leaves, it’s a lovely way to leave and he’s going to Saudi Arabia where people have been hammering people for going there.

“The respect, consideration for that player, you see it at Bayern, Barcelona, some of the players who leave those football clubs, the admiration, you think ‘wow, it’s nice what they’ve put on for him there’.”

No doubt, if De Gea does leave, United will look to somehow give him a good send-off and tribute, however, by keeping their options open, the club may be burning bridges with the goalkeeper.

United are negotiating a deal currently with Andre Onana, The Telegraph report, but could still ask De Gea to be a number two. It is unclear if he would be prepared to accept that.