Former Manchester United player Daniel Nardiello has revealed former Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson prevented him from buying his own home until he learnt how to cook.

Nardiello told Daily Star: “I had my first three years at United, I’d done quite well in the youth teams and reserve level and Sir Alex offered me a three-year contract, which I was obviously going to take. But with the new contract, and my time at the digs coming to an end, I wanted to buy my own property, my own house to live in.

“But youth players need to have permission, so I had to knock on the door to ask if I can buy my own property. He was like ‘No, I’m not letting you buy your own property unless you’ve had three months of cooking lessons with the chef at Carrington.

“So for three months, a couple of times a week, I was out cooking all the food for the first team players. I was in a bit earlier than I would normally be to help the chef. Once the three months were up, I knocked on the gaffer’s door again and he allowed me to pursue buying a home and moving in to my own house. But it goes to show the level of detail he went into.

“He wanted to make sure the club was run properly from top to bottom, wanted to look after his players, making sure they had the best start. I’m not a good cook now though, my wife doesn’t want my cooking, it’s once in a blue moon I cook, but it did give me a good grounding.”