49ers news: Charvarius Ward barks at Cardinals WR DeAndre Hopkins

The 49ers soundly beat the Cardinals on Monday Night Football, but Charvarius Ward is keeping the fight going against DeAndre Hopkins.

The San Francisco 49ers might have their latest player-versus-player rivalry budding up nicely.

As the notable quell between wide receiver Deebo Samuel and Los Angeles Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald has quieted down a bit, the Niners may be enjoying another standoff between cornerback Charvarius Ward and Arizona Cardinals wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins, who quite literally faced off against each other during San Francisco’s Week 11 win over Arizona on Monday Night Football.

Hopkins did plenty of damage for most of the first half, yes, amassing seven catches for 77 yards. But the 49ers quieted him up after halftime to the tune of two catches for 14 yards and kept him out of the end zone the entire game.

Ward, however, wasn’t too impressed.

Charvarius Ward talks trash on DeAndre Hopkins after 49ers beat Cardinals

Joining KNBR 680 on the Tuesday after the Niners’ victory in Mexico City, Ward didn’t mince any words when it came to describing his thoughts about Hopkins:

"D Hop, he think he a tough guy. He think he still one of the best receivers in the league and he really not. He was trying to talk noise and talk hard all game. We not scared of him. He thought we was scared of him. He tried to intimidate us, but forget him, we did our thing. We went out there and got a dub and we did our job. He was just yip-yapping all game, but we don’t care about that. We just wanted to win."

Meanwhile, Ward was credited with a team-high 10 tackles, one of which was for a loss, and San Francisco held Arizona to just 314 net yards, 247 of which came through the air.

Ward also didn’t mind throwing some shade at Hopkins in light of the latter’s six-game suspension earlier this season for using PEDs, pointing out how the receiver was playing a little dirty on Monday night:

"He was getting locked up. He was doing some dirty things. He tried to clip me, he grabbed me by the throat. He grabbed my facemask on one play, so I don’t respect his game. That’s steroid boy."

Shots fired.

Interestingly enough, the 49ers will play the Cardinals one more time this season in Week 18 at Levi’s Stadium, and one can only hope both Ward and Hopkins will have the chance to line up opposite each other once more.

It might make for good television… just maybe.