Ferdinand: No problem with Madrid

The FA said on Monday that they did not want to play the match at the Bernabeu, after England’s players were racially abused the last time they played there in 2005.

He said: “Going back to Madrid is not a problem. Wherever the FA ask us to play isn’t a problem. The players won’t mind that.

“Everyone knows what happened last time. If we did go back there, it’d be nice to imagine that the same kind of stuff that happened to the black players last time doesn’t happen again.

“You remember different games for different reasons. That one was remembered for the wrong reasons, which isn’t nice.

“The Bernabeu holds a lot of great memories for different players and fans across the world, but those were bad memories for us from that one international.”