A biography for Ryan Babelhasn’t been written yet.
“I would be so proud to finish my career with a European medal.”
“Rafa Benitez promised me a certain development, but very quickly he took away that promise and it was a totally different situation.”
“Football players have to grow up very fast. It's a tough life sometimes.”
“It is a normal thing for a young player to want to prove himself in the Premiership.”
“If you see the kids now they have attitude and a strong character. They play one or two games and demand they are involved. I didn't have that. I was too polite. It is not maybe always good to have fight, but gives a stamp - it shows directly that 'I am here. I mean business.'”
“I was 20 years old went I went to the Premier League. When you are 20, you need from other people, you need people to talk to you. But when I went over there, nobody helped me.”
“I play for my country and I am an established international.”
“I've said in earlier interviews maybe I should have stayed one or two more years in Holland.”
“They used to have selection days for all the local kids and I went to these trials three times and got turned down every time. On the third time I was so upset because I thought I was not good enough. I was eight years old and I had the feeling, 'That's it, I don't want to play for Ajax any more!'”
“If you see my record I'm not a stereotype killer striker.”
“Nobody likes me. I know that the Holland boss, Ronald Koeman, appreciates me. But for pundits, TV commentators and in the media, I don't even exist.”
“If the vision is not right and if the right group of players is not together, it doesn't come together.”
“I have never been a difficult person.”
“A lot of things that were written about me bothered me, like my mentality was not good.”
“For a lot of different reasons I didn't fulfil my potential.”
“I suppose people lost interest in me when I left Liverpool; but it wasn't me who left, it was other people who left me. If people had continued to follow me, they would have seen my two good seasons in Turkey which caught the attention of Besiktas and Galatasaray.”