Former Lazio sports director Walter Sabatini has spoken of how they lost Federico Macheda to Manchester United.
Macheda was snapped up by United from Lazio's youth team.
Sabatini was in charge at the time and said: "We have done everything possible, even when it came to offering him a contract, we offered him a place on the first team squad.
"But I respected the choice of the family, the parents were young and wanted him to try maybe an important experience of life.
"We also attempted to establish a relationship of equal dignity with the English club. I proposed to Manchester, via a letter sent to Sir Alex Ferguson, to manage him together for the dignity of Manchester and Lazio.
"I asked him not to take away the player from Lazio, a club with one hundred and eleven years of history. But Ferguson said he was very determined and that the international regulations allowed him to take the boy and so they took him away."
Macheda is currently on-loan at Sampdoria.
