Former United wonderkid forced to endure “torturous” sessions by club chief who wanted him gone – report

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Former Manchester United academy product Ryan Tunnicliffe was put through a torturous training regime last season designed to force him to quit Adelaide United.

Tunnicliffe won the Youth Cup in 2011 alongside Paul Pogba and Jesse Lingard. He was highly regarded, winning the Jimmy Murphy Young Player of the Year award in the 2010-2011 season.

He made two senior appearances for the club before leaving for Fulham in 2013.

The midfielder would play numerous years in the Championship for teams such as Wigan Athletic and Millwall.

Tunnicliffe moved to Australia to play for Adelaide United in the 2023-2024 season after leaving Portsmouth.

Australian outlet 7NEWSAdelaide (via The Sun) report that he suffered some major drama whilst he was in Adelaide.

He was allegedly “forced into ‘torturous’ training sessions in a bid to make him quit his club.”

The club’s technical director, Ernest Faber, wanted the former United man out and undermined the head coach at the time, Carl Veart by getting involved with decisions on the player’s place in the team.

7News Adelaide reported that Faber “forced unwanted import Ryan Tunnicliffe to train on his own, putting him through torturous running sessions in the hope he would quit the club”.

The Englishman only played a total of four matches last season before leaving the Australians in May.

Former assistant coach Travis Dodd, who spilt the beans on the whole saga, claimed that he instructed the former United man to not let the experience break him.

He added, “and credit to him, for two weeks he rocked up when he was asked to rock up, did what he was asked to do, and seemingly Ernest (Faber) had had enough after two weeks and let him rejoin the first-team squad.”

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