Former Spain midfielder Marcos Senna has again spoken of how close he came to joining Manchester United.

The Villarreal hero was regarded as one of the world's best holding midfielders at one stage and attracted interest from Sir Alex Ferguson as the legendary Scot was rebuilding his United midfield.

Senna recalled to Goal: “I did not talk to [Ferguson], but my agent and Villarreal did, and I was very close to signing for Manchester United.

“At that stage I was full of doubts, my wife was pregnant with our first son and our adaptation here was excellent.

“Manchester United had asked me for [a response in] a few weeks, but we were creating a great team here: the club bought Robert Pires, Nihat Kahveci and Giuseppe Rossi was here, we had a great team.

“Personally, I would have loved to play for Manchester United at that time, but I also had desires to stay here. Villarreal had just played a Champions League semi-final and were buying big players.

“To be honest, I was 50/50 until I spoke to [former boss Manuel] Pellegrini and finally I signed for three more years with Villarreal and at the end I spent all my European career here in Spain."