English professional footballer Rio Ferdinand has said that it would be impossible for him to forgive John Terry after he made racist comment about his brother Anton.
But his issues with Terry regarding his racist slur will not go beyond that and that he is still willing to play for England alongside Terry if he would be given the chance to do so.
It all started when Chelsea captain Terry used racist language between Chelsea and QPR in November 2011. Because of the said incident, Terry was banned by the association for four games.
What irked Ferdinand was the fact that Terry did not admit his wrong doings and that he did not the least apologize to him or to his brother right then.
According to Ferdinand, in his autobiography #2sides "for me, the biggest idiot will always be John Terry. As England captain and my centre-back partner he could have saved everyone a lot of pain by admitting immediately that he had used the words in the heat of the moment, but was no racist."
He added "I think that's probably what happened and what the truth is. Anton and I would've accepted that - instead he never gave us the chance. I've never actually spoken to John about the case. I no longer talk to him, but even three years later I find it impossible to forgive or forget the pain he put my family through."
According to Ferdinand, the incident did a lot of damage to his family. Anton received death threats while his mother landed in the hospital for stress related condition after her window was smashed with a stone and a bullet struck their post.
Ferdinand said "We weren't best mates, but we were football buddies. Yet he just sat there and watched as my brother went through all that because of his stupidity. That was the betrayal. He tried to run away from what he'd done."
Currently Ferdinand has already retired from International Football since May 2013 and is now playing for QPR. But according to him, if he is given the chance to play for the national team, he would definitely do so alongside with Terry.
He said "Strange as it might sound, I would've been happy to play for England alongside him. I've played with people I didn't like for years. There were some at Manchester United I wouldn't go for a drink with, call or text. But I played with them."
He added "The England coach Roy Hodgson should have at least asked, 'Could you play with John Terry?' If I said 'No', then okay, one of us is out of the equation. They can pick the other. But that conversation never took place. It could all have been handled much better."
