GARY NEVILLE ADMITS his dislike of Liverpool as a football club still lingers over six years after his retirement as a Manchester United player, but says he’s never had any problem with fans when co-commentating at Anfield.

Neville says he felt ‘relief’ when his old nemeses failed to break their Premier League duck in 2014, but that he suspected José Mourinho’s Chelsea might spoil the party on 27 April of that year when he watched the Portuguese manager arrive on Merseyside atypically unkempt and sporting casual wear.

With Chelsea gearing up for a Champions League semi-final the following week, Liverpool at the time moved to deny that they had rejected the Londoners’ request to move their Premier League fixture forward from the Sunday to the Saturday (the Premier League had dismissed the proposal in any case).

Speaking to Jonathan Shrager on Stretty News TV, Neville opined that Liverpool lived to regret the manner with which they dealt with the situation.

“I never want them to win a league ever again,” he said of United’s rivals.

“I was commentating on Sky a few years ago when City and Liverpool were going for the league, and travelling to Anfield to do the games towards the end, you could feel the tension. You know what it was like here [Manchester] when United were going for it for that first time. ’92/93, Blackburn – that feeling was like unbelievable. Being a United fan, winning the league for the first time [in Neville's lifetime] – it was like that in Anfield… Building.

“They beat City. There were queues of fans – thousands of fans – coming to watch the team come in. And then the Chelsea game came, and they upset José [Mourinho]. They wouldn’t move the game from the Sunday to the Saturday.

“I always remember doing the commentary on that match, because Sky were always at the big games – or are always at the big games – towards the end of the season, and José came out, beard overgrown, looking like he’d not slept, tracksuit on, looking completely un-José-like.

And he came out for the warm-up, and he brought his defence over, and his goalkeeper, and I remember the producer who I knew really well, I remember there’s a button that goes down to him for sound, and I remember saying to him: ‘José’s at it.’ And he was at it. He was not going to let them ever, ever win that match. They’d annoyed him, they’d pissed him off. And I always remember thinking that cost them, that.

“There was a relief, actually, in some ways.”

Neville went on to claim his personal prejudice bore no impact on his duties as a co-commentator on the day.

Indeed, the former United right-back suggested the animosity towards him from ardent Reds had subsided somewhat in recent years, shrugging off the notion that he ‘hated’ Liverpool as a club in spite of the famous United chant which states ‘he hates Scousers’.

“You know, from a neutral perspective, I’m doing it on Sky, I have to obviously call it as I see it. Suarez, Sturridge, Sterling – they were outstanding going forward. Suarez was incredible. But I didn’t want them to win the league because it’s too deep-rooted.

“But ‘hate’? No. ‘Hate’ means I’m waking up every day thinking about it. Hate means I’m carrying something… No. I sit with one every week now as well!

When I’ve been to Anfield or Goodison Park in the last five years, to be honest with you I’ve not had one moment’s bother. They’ve all been quite friendly – you know, bit of banter as you’d expect. You’ve got to remember, two weeks ago, 10 days ago, I was there at the Liverpool-Arsenal game. When you get to the commentary position in the new stand, I’ve got to walk through the fans. Now, they put a security guard with me, but not one of them [fans] said a word on the way through.

He did, however, provide a stone-faced response when asked if he’d rather see Manchester City win the Champions League this season or Liverpool finally win the Premier League next term: “City to win the Champions League, without hesitation.”

Subscribe to The42 podcasts here:

Uefa are dramatically changing international football from next year – here’s what you need to know