The Leicester full-back on his experience of being racially abused and pushing for Champions League football with his club and a Euro spot for Portugal”Yes, I think it was just once but I was young,” says Ricardo Pereira, taking a deep breath as he remembers being racially abused. “I was at Sporting but it was nothing very serious. I was a little bit shocked because I was young but it’s something that you learn to deal with.”Now recognised as one of the Premier League’s best full-backs, the 26-year-old from Lisbon has come a long way since he was released by his boyhood club as a teenager. Ricardo was voted Leicester’s player of the season after signing from Nice in 2018 for €25m and had continued his swashbuckling displays into this campaign until he sustained an anterior cruciate ligament injury in the last Premier League match before lockdown. Related: Black Lives Matter has exposed sport's underlying failure to deal with racism | Jonathan Liew We noticed a change in intensity in the first training session under Brendan Rodgers. Week by week we have improved Related: Premier League rises to occasion with players taking a knee Continue readingreadfullarticle
