By early 2002, Eriksson apparently left a message on McManaman's answering machine to inform him that he was not going to be in the final World Cup squad. Despite the pleas of McManaman's Real Madrid teammates Zidane, Raul and Fernando Hierro for McManaman's case, McManaman said he never heard from or met Eriksson again. Zidane went on to state England had made a mistake and described McManaman as one of the highest quality players he ever played with. Support for McManaman also came before the 2002 World Cup in the British media, after Sky Sports published an article based on OPTA statistics, revealing that despite a poor goalscoring record, McManaman had, in fact, an 88% dribbling completion rate (having embarked on a run every 17 minutes), and an 84% pass completion rate, all three of which were higher by over 15% than any English midfield Premiership player at the time.