Brian McBride - USA International - FFC striker

Success due to 'hard work':
“You definitely have to try and understand the game,” he says. “Hard work means at training you have to be trying to adapt, to learn, to understand where your team-mates are going to normally get the ball, position-wise. Defensively, how you need to get yourself in the spots where you are going to help the team win the ball in better positions. Really you just need to try and make sure you do it in practice, then on the field it comes to you a lot easier than just trying to figure it out just in games.”

On getting 'stuck in':
“A few whacks, I think. My heads taken it’s fair share of stitches and a few odds and ends of other things. But I think that’s probably happened to a lot of players who are centre forwards or centre halves. It’s part of the job. I think if you start shying away from it, it’s going to affect the way you play. If you don’t take the hits you are showing a lack of respect to your team-mates and, for a large part, the game itself.”