Premier League icon Jamie Vardy has admitted he was shocked by the training methods whilst at Serie A side Cremonese.
Former Leicester City striker Vardy decided to leave Cremonese when his contract expires this summer after what was a tough season for the former England star.
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The 39-year-old scored seven goals and provided three assists in 29 appearances, but his efforts were fruitless as the club were relegated after finishing 18th, 4 points away from 17th place Lecce.
Now, speaking on Jamie Vardy’s Having A Party, the veteran revealed that life in Italy as a player was much different as he was pushed to his absolute limit physically.
“How is Italian football compared to English football? It’s much slower, more defensive. Training is nonstop: run, run, run. Then you go into a match and, literally, you have nothing left to give. It’s not nice when you’re 38, 39, right? But not just for me. Here, it works like that. And the sporting director has a say in everything; it’s crazy.
“Before the Bologna match, we did what we usually do in England. So we had a day off after the game. Everyone came onto the pitch feeling very fresh, and we won 3-1. Everyone was euphoric.
“So in my head, I was thinking: ‘Good, we’ll keep going like this.’ And instead… no, we went back to training every day, because ‘this match is really important.’ But how? All matches are important, there’s no difference, at least that’s my mentality.”
Vardy scored 200 goals in 500 appearances across all competitions at Leicester and the club’s style of training clearly suited him for several years.
Now, after leaving Cremonese where he was utterly exhausted, he is a free agent in the twilight of his career as he weighs up his options.
