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From a distance of 1,700km and more than six years, Morgan Schneiderlin admonishes his younger, more impetuous self.

Schneiderlin is 'mad with myself' for retreating into his shell at Manchester United, the club he joined in summer 2015 from Southampton. Equally, the Frenchman rues the rashness of a decision to leave Old Trafford after only 18 months.

A career he describes as 'a rollercoaster, not a stable life', has taken him to Western Sydney Wanderers, via Everton and parent club OGC Nice, after Schneiderlin began the calendar year searching for a challenge that would 'give me goosebumps'.

And, sure enough, the skin is prickly. Schneiderlin is part of a team with genuine designs on the A-League title and 'loves life' with his young family on Bondi Beach.

It's just that Schneiderlin envisaged a wholly different scenario when he arrived at Manchester United, aged 25 and accompanied by a reputation as one of the continent's most enterprising and forceful midfielders.

'I know if I played to my full potential, with freedom, I would not be in Australia right now,' says Schneiderlin.

'Maybe I would still be at Manchester United. When I signed, I wanted to be a legend there. That is why I am mad with myself and it will be hard until the end of my life.

'My friends ask, 'Why are you saying this?' But I know myself and what I can bring. I know this time at Manchester United affected me for the longest period in my career.

'I was so frustrated I couldn't give what I wanted. I had a period after at Everton when I didn't lose the fire, but I lost a little bit inside me, I am not going to hide that. I should have managed it better.

'You work so hard to be at the top, top level. A lot of people were telling me I would be one of the top players in the world. I had the gut feeling that I had everything to be a top player in the world. Not being able to reach that level will stay with me forever.'

Schneiderlin transferred to Southampton, aged 18, when impoverished Strasbourg were forced to cash in on their prize asset.

The player recalls a debut in the Championship at Cardiff City when 'after 15 minutes I thought I'd walked into a tsunami, I knew I was not ready'.

Dean Wilkins, then Southampton first-team coach and brother of late former England midfielder Ray, told Schneiderlin that without fitness and aggression to marry to a proficient technique his rich potential would remain unfulfilled.

'I employed a personal chef and my own fitness coach,' says Schneiderlin. 'And in training sessions, I wasn't focusing on my passing… I didn't give a damn about losing the ball, I just wanted to get the ball back. I thank Dean Wilkins a lot.'

Schneiderlin won successive promotions with Southampton in 2011 and 2012 and in three Premier League seasons with the club routinely rated highly among the division's midfielders for the tackles and interceptions he wedded to a sharp, progressive passing game.

The south coast club gave Schneiderlin 'my happiest years'. 'Southampton was a family,' he says. 'So many clubs say, 'We are a family'. But for most of them, it is bull****.'

Schneiderlin discovered a comparatively darker mood at Manchester United. He made a personally encouraging start, nonetheless – of his opening 16 Premier League appearances, United won 10 and drew five, including home and away victories over Liverpool and a win at Everton when Schneiderlin scored his first goal for the club – but, by his own reckoning, the midfielder was a husk of the assertive, influential footballer who excelled for Southampton.

'I was too affected by what [manager] Louis van Gaal was asking from me,' says Schneiderlin. 'I lost me as a player. It was not me on the field.

'It was not just the manager's fault, it was my fault, too. My role was not the one I had at Southampton. I felt restricted in my game. I felt they wanted to change things in me. I was not thinking as me, I was thinking about what pleased the coach.

'When you reach that point, every pass you make, everything you do, you don't play free. Something stopped me from being who I was. I wanted so much to do well and it is one of the most frustrating things ever.'

Schneiderlin acknowledges Manchester United's wilting form wasn't conducive to allowing a £25m signing to 'go under the radar' while adapting to a vaster, more unforgiving environment. The club was two years post-Sir Alex Ferguson and had fallen sharply from the Premier League's business end.

'It was a weird feeling at Manchester United,' says Schneiderlin. 'For me, it is the biggest club in the world, no doubt, but I joined at the wrong time.

'The training ground needed to be more modern and other things needed to change. You could feel the atmosphere at the club wasn't great. I was very surprised, I was thinking, sometimes, 'Come on, we are all playing for Manchester United, we should smile every day, of course there is high pressure but you need to be strong to play'.

'As a player, you always blame yourself and I know what went wrong with me. If you play for Manchester United, you have quality, I was full of dreams going there and didn't expect things to go that way.'

Schneiderlin didn't get on the field during France's home Euro 2016 campaign. He returned to Old Trafford to play only 11 minutes of Premier League football in the opening half of the campaign under Van Gaal's successor, Jose Mourinho.

The paucity of action eventually convinced the player to join his old Southampton manager Ronald Koeman at Everton.

Initially, Schneiderlin concluded he'd 'made the best decision ever'. He gained instant supporter acclaim and free-scoring Everton achieved European qualification.

But 25-goal striker Romelu Lukaku was sold prior to the following season, while home-grown talent Ross Barkley wouldn't kick another ball for the club before joining Chelsea mid-campaign. Koeman lost his job two months into the new season following a poor start domestically and in Europe. Everton's mishmash recruitment in summer 2017 is prominent on many observers' lists of reasons for the club's current ills.

'I spoke with Spanish and Italian clubs that played in the Champions League or Europa League,' says Schneiderlin. 'But Everton had ambition to be a top-four club and with the team I joined, I think we could have got there. You always want to play in the big, big clubs and I really thought with all my heart Everton would be one of them. It is a big club but from the conversations I had with Ronald Koeman and the chairman [Bill Kenwright] and sporting director [Steve Walsh], I really thought this club would be top, top, top every year.

'At Everton, I found joy again. The fans were liking me. I was sad when Koeman left. The club was selling me a project with him… then we lost some big players and didn't take the direction I'd been told (slants hand upwards). I could see with the transfer business they did, we wouldn't go like this.

'People shouldn't misinterpret this. I don't regret going to Everton. But I regret leaving Manchester United so early. I should have thought, 'You worked all your life for this and spent seven years at Southampton going from League One to become a top Premier League player. Stay and you will succeed'.'

Schneiderlin's Goodison Park popularity rating plummeted when, alongside teammate Kevin Mirallas, he was excluded from the matchday squad for a Premier League game against Watford after it was reported the pair walked off the training pitch 24 hours earlier. The timing of a story Schneiderlin vehemently denies – and which visibly angers him to this day ('it was crap') – was

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