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Motivation Quote by Bryan Robson

"Nobody is that thick-skinned that it doesn't hurt you. Still, you always know what happens in football. I have got used to criticism, I suppose, having been high profile with England and Man U"

About this Quote

Robson doesn’t dress toughness up as a superpower; he punctures it. “Nobody is that thick-skinned that it doesn’t hurt you” is the admission athletes are trained to avoid, especially athletes stamped with the old-school English ideal of stoicism. The line works because it refuses the myth of the unbothered professional while still protecting his authority: yes, it hurts, but it doesn’t undo him.

Then he pivots to the machinery of the sport: “you always know what happens in football.” That’s not resignation so much as fluency. Football, in Robson’s era and even more now, is a predictable churn of narratives - hero on Saturday, liability by Tuesday, savior again by next month. He’s signaling that criticism isn’t a surprise attack; it’s weather. You don’t take it personally, you prepare for it.

The subtext is about exposure. “High profile with England and Man U” isn’t casual name-dropping; it’s shorthand for a specific kind of scrutiny where performance becomes national property and tabloids act like moral referees. Those institutions magnify everything: a misplaced pass reads as character, a loss reads as weakness, leadership becomes a target rather than a compliment.

“I have got used to criticism, I suppose” carries a small, telling shrug. Getting used to it isn’t the same as being immune. The intent is quietly human: to normalize the sting without dramatizing it, and to remind us that even legends absorb the noise - they just learn to keep playing through it.

Quote Details

TopicResilience
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Citation Formats

APA Style (7th ed.)
Robson, Bryan. (2026, January 15). Nobody is that thick-skinned that it doesn't hurt you. Still, you always know what happens in football. I have got used to criticism, I suppose, having been high profile with England and Man U. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/nobody-is-that-thick-skinned-that-it-doesnt-hurt-167114/

Chicago Style
Robson, Bryan. "Nobody is that thick-skinned that it doesn't hurt you. Still, you always know what happens in football. I have got used to criticism, I suppose, having been high profile with England and Man U." FixQuotes. January 15, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/nobody-is-that-thick-skinned-that-it-doesnt-hurt-167114/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Nobody is that thick-skinned that it doesn't hurt you. Still, you always know what happens in football. I have got used to criticism, I suppose, having been high profile with England and Man U." FixQuotes, 15 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/nobody-is-that-thick-skinned-that-it-doesnt-hurt-167114/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.

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Bryan Robson (born January 11, 1957) is a Athlete from England.

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