Ronaldo: Stay or go?

Will Ronaldo be at Utd next season?

  • Yes

    Votes: 824 52.3%

  • No

    Votes: 753 47.7%
  • Total voters
    1,577
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Escobar said:
Just dont play him, simple. Tell him that, he wont have any leverege so….
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We sometimes forget, because of the insane weekly pay, but there is a players Union! To just not pay him would be a breach of contract and the Union and his lawyers would be all over it and he can afford good lawyers!

However, players can be fined for breaches of discipline, I think 2 weeks wages max. so with the reduction for none CL qualification lets guess at £700,000 every 2 weeks for Ronaldo. Well I can think of three things* he has done wrong straight away so that takes us to mid-September and I bet there will be more. He needs to be held accountable.

*i) left pre-season early on Sunday.
ii) went to Portugal unauthorised last season, missed Liverpool game (or was it the City one, it was a biggy)
iii) knocked a phone out of a kids hands, walking off at the end of a game - major show of petulance. Don't know what happened with that, bet the kid got a new phone and then some! who paid, Ronaldo or the club?

What bothers me about this whole thing is something someone said a few days ago (I forget who or I'd quote them) - that Ronaldo will most likely stay at the club, because our numerous sponsors (shirt sponsors, noodle suppliers etc.) will want him to.

I think this would be a big mistake, he is toxic and should be forced out via multiple club fines if he wont put his hand in his pocket and buy out his own contract. I fear not though because for 20 years now Man Utd. has been a money making machine first, a football club second and even though he will cause so much trouble on and off the pitch the accountants and all the companies tied in with the club will still want him here. ETH has a massive battle on his hands, if Ronaldo goes it will tell me he has won and has a chance at United, if Ronaldo stays it will tell me the opposite: player power and the financial people will have won and I would guess ETH will have 18 months max. in the job.
 
Azhar88 said:
We sometimes forget, because of the insane weekly pay, but there is a players Union! To just not pay him would be a breach of contract and the Union and his lawyers would be all over it and he can afford good lawyers!

However, players can be fined for breaches of discipline, I think 2 weeks wages max. so with the reduction for none CL qualification lets guess at £700,000 every 2 weeks for Ronaldo. Well I can think of three things* he has done wrong straight away so that takes us to mid-September and I bet there will be more. He needs to be held accountable.

*i) left pre-season early on Sunday.
ii) went to Portugal unauthorised last season, missed Liverpool game (or was it the City one, it was a biggy)
iii) knocked a phone out of a kids hands, walking off at the end of a game - major show of petulance. Don't know what happened with that, bet the kid got a new phone and then some! who paid, Ronaldo or the club?

What bothers me about this whole thing is something someone said a few days ago (I forget who or I'd quote them) - that Ronaldo will most likely stay at the club, because our numerous sponsors (shirt sponsors, noodle suppliers etc.) will want him to.

I think this would be a big mistake, he is toxic and should be forced out via multiple club fines if he wont put his hand in his pocket and buy out his own contract. I fear not though because for 20 years now Man Utd. has been a money making machine first, a football club second and even though he will cause so much trouble on and off the pitch the accountants and all the companies tied in with the club will still want him here. ETH has a massive battle on his hands, if Ronaldo goes it will tell me he has won and has a chance at United, if Ronaldo stays it will tell me the opposite: player power and the financial people will have won and I would guess ETH will have 18 months max. in the job.
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I said play, not pay.
 
Escobar said:
I said play, not pay.
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Oh gosh, yes you did, I feel a right fool now!

By-the-way, I agree - he shouldn't play, I've actually said elsewhere he shouldn't even be on the bench this weekend, because of what happened last Sunday and the fact he's had basically no pre-season. I will be so interested in the team announcement on Sunday.
 
Azhar88 said:
Oh gosh, yes you did, I feel a right fool now!

By-the-way, I agree - he shouldn't play, I've actually said elsewhere he shouldn't even be on the bench this weekend, because of what happened last Sunday and the fact he's had basically no pre-season. I will be so interested in the team announcement on Sunday.
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No worries man, felt sorry for the time you took to write it down so well. But we agree, pay him, but dont play
 
Zlaatan said:
When Juventus added Ronaldo to their team in 2018 they went from a 87-goal season to a 70 goal season, when he came to United we went from 73 goals to 57. So there's also a solid relationship between "add Ronaldo to your team" and "don't score as many goals".
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You make a very good point. Even though he scores many goals, the overall tally is lower.
I still believe that we need CR7 in our team, given how poor it is. He will most likely be our best outfield player this season, as he was last season.
 
sunama said:
You make a very good point. Even though he scores many goals, the overall tally is lower.
I still believe that we need CR7 in our team, given how poor it is. He will most likely be our best outfield player this season, as he was last season.
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If he ends up our best player this season then I feel confident in saying it'll be another disastrous season
 
On a more general level, can I just raise this point: it must be so difficult to retire from the game (or indeed play at a lower level than CL and World Cups) and especially so when you are one of the all time greats.

Wayne Rooney got a lot of grief on here and in the mainstream media too. He has made mistakes on and off the field. But it has to be said, he dropped down a level to play for his original club (Everton) then finished off as a player-manager at Derby and I think he ended his career with dignity.

Ronaldo could do something similar, become a super-sub, throw his weight behind a good cup run, especially in the Europa (probably our best chance of getting back into the CL soon in my opinion) help the younger players develop and think about his own future as a coach or manager.

But its so unlikely to happen, because he is just so selfish.

I can't remember the exact figures, but at Juventus he took numerous free kicks (18-25 yrds out) and I think only one went in. After 20 or 30 misses, did he not think... 'oh maybe I'll let someone else have a go....' I bet he didn't and that's why we should never have resigned him. He is too much of a prima donna.
 
city-puma said:
Exactly.
I especially like what ETH explained, simple and clear, the plan and roadmap,
1. Construct the team and only add new players who are the right ones; if impossible to find, develop by ourselves
2. Has a good concept
3. Grow and develop as a team (playing and management) with togetherness
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Did Man Utd suddenly become a charity?
 
Zlaatan said:
When Juventus added Ronaldo to their team in 2018 they went from a 87-goal season to a 70 goal season, when he came to United we went from 73 goals to 57. So there's also a solid relationship between "add Ronaldo to your team" and "don't score as many goals".
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The Juventus data point is misleading. Since Juventus won the Serie A title in 11/12 up until Ronaldo's arrival, they averaged 75.5 goals in Serie A, with a standard deviation of 6. In the three seasons that Ronaldo was at the club, they averaged 74.3 goals with a standard deviation of 3.8, basically the same number. The 86 goals in the season before he joined were a huge outlier. According to FBREF, the xG for the 86 and 70 goal seasons was basically the same (58-59 xG); that would be good evidence that the 86 goals were just chance.

By comparison, his absence from Real Madrid is still felt. They scored 63, 70, 67, and 80 goals in the last four seasons. The last season, with a Ballon d'Or level player leading the line, is still low in goals relative to when he was there.

Obviously goals are not solely down to individual players, lots of things go into it. "Ronaldo is the only reason why we scored goals last season" is not a good argument, but it does not mean people should just make the inverted bad argument of "he has no influence in us scoring goals."
 
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Since, it seems that no other team that is currently in the Champions League actually wants Ronaldo, the question is moot. Ronaldo is United player, not because United won't let him go, but because he has nowhere to go. Let's hope that Ten Haag's no-nonsense approach can rein in a bit of the Ronaldo ego.

I would have preferred that he had never re-signed for United, unless it was for some sort of final farewell tour. But, he is here and let's hope that United can make the best of it.
 
Seems to me, like CR7 wasn't the reason that united sucked last season? could it be? United needs to buy class players, get rid of the dalot's and mctominays. Why is Maguirre playing ahead of Varane? One guy won everything with real madrid and france and the other one is an english man. Can't wrap my mind around it, it's sad to see a club like united be average for so long now, get yo asses out of the mud!
 
How on earth can you criticise this guy for wanting to leave this shambles of a club? Of course he feels like he's just wasting some of the final seasons in his career.
 
I reckon we'd let him go without much of a fight if anyone actually wanted him.

Mental that he caused such a ruckus before figuring out whether or not he even had any suitors. Absolute eejit.
 
ronaldmcdonald said:
Seems to me, like CR7 wasn't the reason that united sucked last season? could it be? United needs to buy class players, get rid of the dalot's and mctominays. Why is Maguirre playing ahead of Varane? One guy won everything with real madrid and france and the other one is an english man. Can't wrap my mind around it, it's sad to see a club like united be average for so long now, get yo asses out of the mud!
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Because he is 80m and the owners wont write him off
 
AndyMUFC said:
How on earth can you criticise this guy for wanting to leave this shambles of a club? Of course he feels like he's just wasting some of the final seasons in his career.
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I don't understand it either, but I respect other's view on the subject. It's a shame everyone is focused on this guy while deadwood is rotting around him.
 
GDaly95 said:
I reckon we'd let him go without much of a fight if anyone actually wanted him.

Mental that he caused such a ruckus before figuring out whether or not he even had any suitors. Absolute eejit.
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It is more like the media caused it around. He privately told the club to let him go if someone bid for him and he did it early in the summer. He has been quiet on it in public.

Of course, not showing up for pre-season for personal reasons which ETH approved muddled it a bit. And the club failing to plan for a CF since January was not on him at this point.
 
If he doesn't stay then we'll have to rely on Martial to be available and to score the goals we need. EtH clearly doesn't think it's a good idea to put Rashford there, probably cause his lack of form/ability/confidence will be really exposed as the main striker.
So given those two things it's fair to say we could really do with him staying.

Ronaldo can see what we can see though. A squad that's not made of the right stuff, a disaster in the transfer market in terms of not strengthening where we have chronic issues, and a unproven manager in a major league. Of course he wants to leave, he wants to win trophies and extend records. He must rue the day he came back and saw what this squad was like.

So I would not begrudge him leaving, even if I think him skipping preseason (if this was part or in full due to angling for a move) was very disappointing/unacceptable. The reality is that we need him, we're not winning games without him this season that's for sure.
 
I actually don’t hate Ronaldo and I hope for his sake he can go play champs league. He’s had a fantastic career and this backwards club is ruining his legacy.
 
dannyrhinos89 said:
I actually don’t hate Ronaldo and I hope for his sake he can go play champs league. He’s had a fantastic career and this backwards club is ruining his legacy.
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Well is the club ruining him, or is he ruining the club? Apparently he is unhappy about having a pay cut enforced on him (due to finishing 6th) yet he is probably a billionaire or close to being one! He could certainly afford to buy himself out of his own contract and go to a team in the Champions League for 'free' if he really wants to add to his stats in that competition.

But most importantly his continued presence at the club is causing disruption within the team. This is the last thing United need with a tricky Brentford match on Saturday and Liverpool after that. Leaks today suggest other players are moaning about him now & I predicted this would happen:

 
At this point he should go for his own good.

I'm sure his CL goals record is extremely important to him as far as his legacy goes and it'd kinda be a shame to see him lose that to Messi just because we're too shite to qualify for the competition. He's 15 goals clear of Messi but Messi is 2 years younger and as of now Ronaldo is gonna lose at least one season of potentially adding to his tally.

This whole thing has to be supremely frustrating for him. Imagine being in his position...his first time with United he was surrounded by world-class players everywhere on the pitch, the team ran like a well-oiled machine. He comes back maybe hoping to wrap his career up nicely and discovers that outside of Pogba and Bruno (MAYBE Cavani) there isn't a player in the squad fit to even share the pitch with him. He's gotta be perplexed at how the club could've gone to hell so badly.
 
I’ve come across a few Chelsea fans (online/irl) that think he will definitely be theirs by close of the window…

I thought Tuchel had ruled this out, anyone know the latest?
 
dannyrhinos89 said:
I actually don’t hate Ronaldo
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It has nothing to do with hating Ronaldo. He will score goals. That is good. The question is: Does his style of play fit with what United are trying to do? and Does his star status interfere with the development of others?
 
It seems pretty quiet for a deadline day, so I assume he is staying?
 
We are not getting a replacement in 1 day and I rather see Ronaldo coming off bench than Elanga or Rashford if we need a goal. He should stay and play out the season.

We actually had a few attacks when he came on and Rashford moved to the left.
 
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