The text I got from Jaap Stam sums him up – I've never worked with someone like that

Manchester United legend Jaap Stam has received high praise from former Reading charge Chris Gunter amid talk of a potential Old Trafford return.

Stam, 51, won three Premier League titles in as many seasons at the Theatre of Dreams, not to mention playing a key role in the iconic 1999 treble-winning campaign. Many United supporters were pained to see the player sold to Lazio in 2001, but reports have linked him with a return to the club's coaching staff more than two decades on.

Former Wales full-back Gunter, 34, spent eight years at Reading, with a quarter of that time spent under Stam's care. And although the Dutch great's time in Berkshire ended on a low note, Gunter didn't hesitate in hailing him as "the best club manager" he's played under.

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"He was incredible. I was away in the Euros with Wales when he got the job at Reading and I was being told dates when I was meant to be back in," Gunter told Get Reading. "But when we kept going further and further in the competition it [my return] was getting pushed back. So all the boys were back in pre-season and we were still in France.

"There were a couple of times he would text and say good luck and a small thing like that - having a text from a manager saying good luck or well done shows they are keeping an eye on you. He was someone I had never met and looking back over time, I'm not really shocked because the way he was with the players, it probably came naturally to him.

"The way he was as a person and what he'd done in his career - he could have come to