Romero happy to fight De Gea for spot as No.1

SERGIO Romero is pleased David de Gea is staying at United even though he is likely to remain their second-choice goalkeeper.

Romero started 18 games last season – 12 of them in the Europa League – and retained his place for the Stockholm final victory over Ajax in May to collect his third trophy in two seasons at Old Trafford.

United manager Jose Mourinho has heaped praise on the 30-yearold Argentina international, who signed a new contract earlier this month until 2021 with the option of an additional year. Mourinho clarified last week De Gea would not leave United this summer and Romero is pleased to get the chance to apply more pressure on the Spaniard.

When asked if it was positive for him that De Gea was staying, Romero replied: “Yes, it’s good for me. He is a friend and we will keep working hard to help each other out in training. If he does well then I do well. So in that way, the level of performance will always be high.

“It’s better for the club that there is this competition there between me and David. The truth is that there exists a great friendship between us, we work hard in order help each other out. It’s very important that we work in this way so we can get the most out of each other.

“If he puts pressure on me, I put pressure on him and it’s the same with Joel [Pereira], who is working with us.”

Mourinho admitted last week he had yet to decide whether Romero would retain his European ‘keeper status after he started all nine of United’s Europa League knockout games last season.

“I don’t know what is going to happen,” Romero added. “We will get to know before each match who is going to start as normal, but we will work hard and the minutes that I get, I will try to take advantage of them.

“I am thankful for the confidence that the manager has given me and last year he had a lot of faith in me and the results showed that, we won the Europa League and I didn’t concede many goals, it’s a situation I look at with calmness and this year I hope to have the same confidence levels so I can respond in the same way.

“I am still learning day by day, I like to work hard and the truth is that this pre-season has been very good.”

United played just one match during their tour of China a year ago and Romero echoed his manager’s glowing summary of the team’s five-match tour of the US.

“It has been a big difference to what happened last year in China,” Romero stressed.

“We have played a lot of matches and we have done things a lot better and you will see the results of that in the long term.”