Frank Lampard’s late night trips to the toilet kept Ferdinand awake

A good sleep, healthy meals and high fitness level are a must for any footballer who wants to be successful. That and a football knowledge, off course. When something is missing, things can go wrong. When he joined England squad, then Manchester United defender Rio Ferdinand had a problem with his longtime friend and roommate Frank Lampard.

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The pair knew each other since their time at West Ham and now it was logical that they were roommates in England squad. And Rio Ferdinand recalled his time with Lampard.

“When I got called up for England I used to share with Frank Lampard. He didn’t snore or anything and he was mostly good but the only thing that was a bit of a bummer was that at midnight he would go to the toilet and it was quite loud. In fact it was really loud. So loud that it used to wake me up. This long, loud p*ss” remembers Lampard.

And while Ferdinand and Lampard used to be teammates at West Ham, by that time they were already rivals, as they switched to Manchester United and Chelsea respectively. Back in 2006, England had a strong selection, with the likes of Neville, Cole, Gerrard, Ferdinand, Terry, Beckham, Lampard, Rooney, Owen, Joe Cole, Campbell  and Carragher , with Sven-Goran Eriksson as a manager, but even the Swede couldn’t come up with the winning formula. And Rio Ferdinand knows the reason - competitiveness of the Premier League.

Lampard and Ferdinand used to party every night

“It overshadowed things. It killed that England team, that generation. One year we would have been fighting Liverpool to win the league, another year it would be Chelsea. So I was never going to walk into the dressing room and open up to Frank Lampard, Ashley Cole, John Terry or Joe Cole at Chelsea, or Steven Gerrard or Jamie Carragher at Liverpool. I wouldn’t open up because of the fear they would take something back to their clubs and use it against us, to make them better than us. I didn’t really want to engage with them” explained Ferdinand back in 2018.