Gary Neville explains what Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard could never do on a football pitch | OneFootball

Gary Neville has fired back at Jamie Carragher’s recent comments on the Paul Scholes vs Steven Gerrard vs Frank Lampard debate.

Speaking on That Peter Crouch Podcast, Carragher said: “People think I don’t like Frank Lampard and I don’t like Paul Scholes, you know when this debate comes up, and I go, ‘They were amazing players, but it’s not even a debate, it’s not close.’

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“I’ll tell you what kills this debate. Alex Ferguson tried to sign him and so did Jose Mourinho. And they had Scholes and Lampard.”

Crouch, Carragher’s former Liverpool teammate, was in agreement with that assessment. Both played with Lampard and Scholes at international level but feel that Gerrard was on another level.

Gary Neville: Scholes could do what Gerrard and Lampard could not

However, Neville has often stated that Scholes is the best footballer he played with - which is high praise coming from a former Manchester United captain who played alongside Cristiano Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney, Ryan Giggs, David Beckham, Roy Keane and countless other superstars.

Neville watched Jorginho produce a magnificent performance for Arsenal in their 2-0 win away at Newcastle United on Sunday.

Speaking at St. James Park on his Sky Sports podcast, Neville explained how Scholes regularly produced similar performances when it really mattered - unlike Gerrard and Lampard.

“I say Paul Scholes is the best football player I’ve ever played with, and we’ve seen an example today of what Paul Scholes used to do out on the pitch,” Neville said.

“In the most difficult atmospheres, in the most tense part of seasons, in the games against the most ferocious opposition, when it’s the most difficult, when everyone else wants to lump it up the pitch… the man who’s going to get on the ball, take it when it’s tight, poke it through midfield, get into shape so that you can set off your attacking movements and patterns, and do that religiously and repetitively through those difficult games was Paul Scholes.

“He did it for 15 years. But certainly those last five to ten years at Manchester United, I’ve never seen anything like it.

“I saw my friend Jamie Carragher almost announcing the end of the Gerrard, Lampard and Scholes debate. Well, Jamie, the debate continues.

“We’ll ignore what Pep Guardiola and Sir Alex Ferguson say about Scholes. We’ll just listen to what Jamie Carragher has to say.

“Carragher cited the fact that Ferguson tried to sign Gerrard, and the fact that Jose Mourinho wanted to sign Gerrard. Of course they did. He was a fantastic player who, at that time, was thinking about leaving Liverpool - and it wasn’t to replace Paul Scholes at Manchester United, I want to be really clear about that.

“Sir Alex Ferguson was not signing Steven Gerrard to replace Paul Scholes. That would never have happened.

“Scholes was the absolute glue in the most difficult moments - and those players now are so critical to teams.

“Gerrard and Lampard were great players - absolutely fantastic players - but they could never, ever do what Scholes did in those difficult moments in games.

“They could run forward, they could create wonderful moments, blistering attacks, they could score goals, they could do mesmerising things that would blow you away… but that out there that we’ve seen from Jorginho, they could never do.

“That’s what we used to see from Scholes every single title-winning season. That’s why he won 11 titles - a large part down to him of how he dealt with composure, presence, authority and courage to play.

“There are very few players that can actually do it when it really mattered. Scholes could - and Gerrard and Lampard couldn’t.

“I know both those players and couldn’t think any higher of them. But those players couldn’t do what Scholes could do in these types of matches.”

Watch the clip here (4:39 on the video):

We’re looking forward to Carragher’s response…