Matthijs de Ligt came up against Newcastle United’s Sandro Tonali in Manchester United’s 2-0 defeat to the Magpies in December.
It wasn’t the first time the centre-back and the midfielder were on the same pitch at the same time. De Ligt was at Juventus between 2019 and 2022 and during his time in Italy, he faced the 24-year-old.
[Cronache di Spogliatoio](https://www.cronachedispogliatoio.it/sandro-tonali-in-esclusiva-a-cronache-lanteprima-vi-racconto-la-terapia-il-milan-e-lo-psicologo/) have been speaking to the Newcastle star, where he revealed that the Manchester United defender tried to help his old club with a little playful transfer advice.
Tonali arrived at Newcastle from AC Milan in July 2023. He initially joined the Serie A side on loan from Brescia in 2020 and the Rossoneri brought him a year later. After his loan spell, there was uncertainty over the Italy international staying at the San Siro.
This allowed Juventus, Inter Milan and others to try and sign the Italy international before he eventually continued at Milan. During the period of uncertainty, the current Newcastle player bumped into De Ligt, who was then at Juventus.
Tonali says the 25-year-old Netherlands international, who joined Manchester United from Bayern Munich last summer, asked him to think about joining Juventus.
_“We were in Sardinia, me, Cistana and Torregrossa, the Brescia group in short,”_ he said.
_“At a restaurant we met De Ligt. It was the year we had played against each other in Serie A, the year of Covid. He spoke highly of Juventus, as a player he advised me to think about it._
_“Those were the days I was negotiating with Milan. We had stopped to talk after a match. It happens that for a handful of seconds you find yourself chatting with an opponent even if you don’t know him, more out of respect._
_“Some of them you then memorise and when you see them, you think: ‘I’ve already seen this’. It was the summer when I ended up in the newspapers, because it was difficult for me to return to Serie B with Brescia. Milan, Inter and Juve were up for grabs all summer. And so, everyone told me: ‘Come to Inter, come to Milan, come to Juve’.”_