Cristiano Ronaldo And The Broken Legacy

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Cristiano Ronaldo is doing his best to remain the centre of attention around the Manchester United Football Club. The Portuguese superstar has been in the spotlight ever since the pre-season for the current campaign, but not once was that for the good reasons. It was not former Real Madrid man’s great goalscoring spree or a run of performance where has helped the younger guys flourish. No, it was not even his leadership that was so hailed after Portugal’s EURO 2016 win.

The reasons were various – from missing the pre-season, to not being able to break it consistently in the starting lineup, to throwing tantrums on the bench, leaving matches early without the coaches approval. But now things have gone too far, with Cristiano Ronaldo deciding to give an exclusive interview to The Sun and Piers Morgan. In it, Ronaldo tears into Man United like never before. And while the fans of CR7 image will protect him and claim that he had said many truthful things about United’s stagnation, lack of improvement on and off the pitch since the departure of Sir Alex Ferguson, the things do not work like that.

Ferguson Himself Would Get Rid Of Ronaldo

Cristiano has done the first thing Sir Alex would hate any of his players to do. He positioned himself as if he is bigger than the club and publicly went against both the club and the team’s manager. Fergie was famous for saying that once a player thinks he is bigger than the club, he has to go. That was in response to the conflict he had with David Beckham in 2003, but this Ronaldo’s public move was far worse. Ronaldo started pointing fingers at everyone, ungracefully failing to realise that for many things, the finger could be pointed at him. He is failing to cope with the fact that before he knows it, he will be 38 and that he is not the player he used to be. That is okay, that happens to every player in the world.

The problem is when Ronaldo starts humiliating Ralf Rangnick by saying he is not even coach. Even though that’s ultimately not true, since Rangnick was well known for his coaching abilities at RB Leipzig, even though he may have preferred the sporting director role. But Ronaldo then ripped into Erik Ten Hag, his current manager, saying he has no respect for the man because the Dutchman does not respect him.

While we do not know what happens behind the scenes, it is hard to defend Ronaldo when he tries to ‘solve problems’ this way, instead of working things out with Ten Hag. The Dutchman never spoke badly about Cristiano, he always had something nice to say about him and his career in the media, even explaining that he did not put Ronaldo on the pitch against Man City while trailing 4-0, out of respect for his career, This Ronaldo move will probably accomplish what he wanted – to get him out of Man United without the need for any other club to pay the transfer fee in January. But even if that happens, Ronaldo’s legacy will be tarnished and the question remains – who will be ready to gamble on him?

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