Cristiano Ronaldo – GAME OF THE PEOPLE

THE IMPACT of Cristiano Ronaldo’s TV interview may have been exactly what he was hoping to achieve, forcing a parting of the ways with his club, Manchester United, but as with all cases of a disenchanted employee speaking out, the aftershock will not be positive on the whistle blower. CR7 and Manchester United are finished, the only thing left to do is to work out a financial settlement that suits both parties. On the other hand, United may well be exploring ways to limit the damage by seeking a way to insist that a contract has been breached. Regardless of the terms, a divorce is certainly in progress.

What Ronaldo did was hit at the very heart of one of football’s 10 commandments, that no player is bigger than the club. This is why United cannot allow what happened to go unpunished or without some sort of repercussion. Ronaldo may be one of the greatest of all time, but he is, after all, paid to play for United and therefore owes the club some sort of disciplined behaviour. Parallels can be drawn with George Best, but United eventually showed even him that they were bigger than the individual. Ronaldo has confirmed that today, a player can be bigger than a club. It’s not the first time, Kylian Mbappé and Neymar have donned the cloak of the primadonna at Paris Saint-Germain and Lionel Messi was allowed his say at Barcelona. These players are prized assets; expensive, cossetted, delicate thoroughbreds with fragile egos, media profiles and business brands. Upset them and you are in danger in upsetting the equilibrium.

Manchester United, when they signed Ronaldo at the start of 2021-22, probably anticipated the return of CR7 would enhance their own brand and also rejuvenate the team on the playing field. But should a club of United’s stature have been so desperate to gain a psychological boost from signing a 36 year-old? Did this not signal that United had lost the plot a little? And he wasn’t the first veteran to be courted in this way – Zlatan Ibrahimović and Edison Cavani were also signed in recent years in the late autumn of their careers. Ronaldo told everyone he felt United were in decline, but did he not realise their enthusiasm to have him back was effectively a symptom of the deterioration at Old Trafford?

There was always going to be a messy conclusion, especially when it was clear United could no longer guarantee Champions League football for Ronaldo. The debacle at the club with Solskjaer and Rangnick also indicated the club had lost its way. It is totally unreasonable to expect Erik ten Hag to build his team around a disaffected Ronaldo, and if the push came to shove, the United board would have to come down on the side of the manager.

Ronaldo’s timing couldn’t be more perfect. He wants to leave, United need him to go, but nobody looks too keen to sign him as the cost and the baggage now outweighs the benefits. He surely knows it, hence he needs a shop window to stake his claim. His first shop window was the TV interview, where he told his story, but the response has not been particularly sympathetic, in fact, by breaking some of football’s unwritten rules, he has arguably alienated people. If anything, he has marked himself as a difficult character to have in a squad.

The second shop window will be Qatar 2022, where he has at least three games to show what he can still do for Portugal, against Ghana, Uruguay and South Korea. He’s a big occasion man, so it is likely he will impress and that will surely be enough to entice a club to sign him. But while that might satisfy Ronaldo, the damage to his reputation will linger on. Nobody likes to see players break ranks, or to imply they are bigger than a club or in need of more respect than their team-mates. Implying there is a lack of respect for a manager also suggests a lack of loyalty and discipline – if it has been done before, it can be done again. By claiming he has been betrayed also hints at betraying others. The Athletic reported that 88% of United fans do not want him to play again for the club – who is feeling most betrayed?

It’s a sad end to a career that has delighted so many people, but football has a habit of making errors of judgement that backfire on clubs, managers and players. Most people with an objective eye could have predicted this would happen and many will tell you that there will be a club owner out there willing to gamble on Cristiano Ronaldo. That’s why Qatar 2022 is so vital for this remarkable player.

WHEN Harry Kane was in dispute with Tottenham Hotspur a year or so ago, people pointed to his lack of medals as a Spurs player. The club hasn’t won anything in Kane’s time, indeed you have to go back to 2008 for their last trophy. Players often claim their desire to leave a club is based on the desire to “win things” and as Kane headed towards 30, you can understand his anxiety about ending his peak years without some sort of bauble to place in his cabinet at Chez Kane.

But not all great players have boxloads of medals when they want to recall their football career. In fact, some of the game’s outstanding names have very little silverware to show for a glittering career. Much depends on who they play for – if you are Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo, the statistics of their careers match the plaudits they have received, because they have played for great, successful clubs. Messi has won 11 league titles and Ronaldo seven, but CR7 has won five Champions League medals to Messi’s four.

Zlatan Ibrahomovic has 12 league titles to his name, from the Netherlands, Italy, Spain and France. Bayern’s Thomas Müller has 11 Bundesliga medals, while Paco Gento of Real won 12 La Ligas with Real Madrid. Johan Cruyff won 10 league titles, along with seven domestic cups and three European Cups. He was a league champion with three different clubs: Ajax, Barcelona and Feyenoord. Kenny Dalglish won 23 major medals in his playing career, including 10 league titles with Celtic and Liverpool. Play for the top clubs and you win medals.

Some players, unfortunately, play the role of big fish at a club less equipped to winning major honours on a regular basis. Tom Finney and Stanley Matthews, two of the wizards of the wing, won praise week-by-week and were mainstays of the England team. Finney was a Preston North End player from 1946 to 1960, he won 76 caps for England but never won a major honour. Matthews won 54 caps during a career that saw him play for Stoke City and Blackpool. His only honour was the FA Cup in 1953. Both these players earned their place in football history because they were truly great at what they did.

Similarly, there were members of the England 1966 winning team that didn’t enjoy incredible success as club players. Gordon Banks, for example, had to wait until the back end of his career for his one and only medal with Stoke City, the Football League Cup in 1972. George Cohen, a fine full back with Fulham, never won a major prize with his club. Ray Wilson won the FA Cup in 1966 with Everton, but injuries prevented him winning more. The Charlton brothers were the most successful, but Bobby’s trophy winning days ended two years after 1966 as Manchester United entered a period of decline. Big Jack was part of Don Revie’s ultra-professional unit that went close to winning everything, but invariably failed at so many final hurdles. Jimmy Greaves, who missed the World Cup final and then drifted away from the England scene, actually only won three medals in English football, the last in 1967.

George Best, for all his brilliance and headlines, won his last medal in 1968. His career was strangely anti-climatic – he won three medals and 37 caps for Northern Ireland. The man who became the face of British football when Best’s star waned, Kevin Keegan, fared much better in his tangible assets haul – three league titles with Liverpool, one with Hamburg, one European Cup, two UEFA Cups and 63 caps for England. It is fair to say Keegan made the most of his career.

Not so players like Best and even Diego Maradona, who won six medals at club level, although lifting the World Cup eclipses most other pieces of objet d’art. Pelé, because he was limited to appearing for Santos for most of his career, also had few items to show for his wonderful skills.

But did this really matter in times gone by? Arguably not. Today, the football world expects the top names to continually grace the big occasions, but given we are talking about a team game, an individual can only do so much. Hence, Messi and Ronaldo have never won the World Cup, even though their fans continually will them to be crowned champion. While the likes of Matthews and Finney were clubmen of the highest order, they were never likely to win the League Championship with their long-time employers. Bobby Moore, another legendary figure, stayed with West Ham for most of his career, a club that was respected and won the occasional cup, but were never contenders for the title. In the modern game, great players gravitate towards the clubs with money and trophy-winning potential. They might start with a West Ham or a Fulham, but they will surely end up with a Chelsea, a Manchester City or Liverpool.

A good way to measure this is to consider the England World Cup squads. In 1966, Alf Ramsey’s 22 players came from 14 different clubs of which nine were playing for the top six of 1965-66. Four years on, the needle had shifted and only 10 clubs were called upon and 11 were from the top six. In more recent times, the World Cup squad of 2018 was drawn from 10 clubs, but 18 of the 23 were from the so-called “big six”.

Other nations have different squad compositions. France, the 2018 World champions, had a squad that was drawn from across Europe, 15 clubs from five different countries. Croatia, the runners-up were even more diverse, 23 players from 21 clubs in no less than 10 countries. This shows that while overseas players tend to ply their trade across the European landscape, English players are more likely to stay at home and the most successful ones move in the direction of the richest and most successful. It is likely, then, that the top players can collect far more medals than their predecessors from past decades.

It would be inappropriate to talk of medals and not recognise some of the most celebrated players. Liverpool’s Phil Neal, for example, won eight league titles and four European Cups while Celtic’s Billy McNeill was Scottish champion nine times and won 23 medals. Ryan Giggs, in a career that spanned 24 seasons, won no less than 13 league titles. And yet, Alan Shearer won a solitary league title with Blackburn and Gary Lineker waited until he was 30 for his only prize in English football with Tottenham, although two years earlier, he did win the European Cup-Winners’ Cup with Barcelona.

Although some players may feel that a career without official recognition may leave an empty feeling when they retire, consolation can be found in the way they are remembered by the people paying to watch them. While medals can be sold to boost the pension pot, the memories of the fans will never fade. It is not always necessary to wear garlands to be identified as a football legend.