Cristiano Ronaldo made the most surprising and shocking move of the transfer window this summer by making an unanticipated move to Juventus from Real Madrid.
Cristiano Ronaldo arrived at Real Madrid Manchester United in 2009 and went on to score 450 goals for them in nine years at the club, an average of exactly 50 strikes per season. In addition to that, the Portuguese left winger also helped Real Madrid to an unprecedented 10th European Cup crown before helping the club add three more of those prestigious trophies. In total, the 5 time Ballon d’Or winner racked up 15 trophies for Real Madrid on a collective level while there were also tonnes of individual awards won and record broke.
However, Real Madrid sold Cristiano Ronaldo to Juventus in July this year for a reported transfer fee of 112 million euros. There was a lot cooking about the Portugal international’s departure from Real Madrid, especially after his comments after the UEFA Champions League Final when the Whites lifted a third successive title following their 3-1 victory over Liverpool. But nobody expected it to really happen and people thought that it would have been just another transfer rumour made to sell.
But Cristiano indeed departed the Spanish capital under surprising circumstances. The European champions were hammered 5-1 by Barcelona on Sunday and are on the brink of seeing their season go to the dogs. The situation at the Santiago Bernabeu is nowhere close to ideal whereas Cristiano Ronaldo has adapted well to his new pastures in the Serie A with the Old Lady of Turin. In an exclusive interview with France Football, Ronaldo revealed why he left the club.
"“I felt it inside the club, especially from the president, that they no longer considered me the same way that they did in the start,” he said. “In the first four or five years there, I had the feeling of being ‘Cristiano Ronaldo’. Less afterwards. The president looked at me through eyes that didn’t want to say the same thing, as if I was no longer indispensable to them, if you know what I mean. That’s what made me think about leaving. Sometimes I’d look at the news, where they were saying I was asking to leave. There was a bit of that, but the truth is that I always had the impression that the president would not hold me back. If it had all been about money, I’d have moved to China, where I would have earned five times as much than here [at Juventus] or at Real. I did not come to Juve for the money. I earned the same in Madrid, if not more. The difference is that, at Juve, they really wanted me. They told me that and made it clear. They showed me that.”"
Ronaldo took a further swipe at Pérez by saying:
"“He only ever looked at me as a business relationship. I know it. What he told me never came from the heart.”"
When the 5 time Ballon d’Or winner was asked whether his decision to leave the club came because of Zinedine Zidane’s resignation, he said:
"” My decision to leave was not based on his departure. That being the case, it’s one of those little things that made me feel a bit better in terms of what I thought of the situation at the club.”"
Opinion
When Cristiano Ronaldo decided to leave Real Madrid, it was sure that the Portugal international’s reason had something to do with either his wage bills or Florentino Perez. A lot of people also thought that his tax issues in relation to the Spanish authorities led to him leaving the club, but in this case, it was indeed Florentino Perez.
In Cristiano Ronaldo, Real Madrid lost probably their greatest player of all time whilst also parting company with someone who would potentially guarantee them a mammoth number of 50 goals per season. What’s more is that Florentino Perez did not even make an effort to sign a replacement for the club’s talisman despite having the funds to spend on the likes of Neymar, Kylian Mbappe or Eden Hazard.
The Real Madrid president, in my opinion, treated Cristiano in an incorrect way by clearly overseeing his tremendous contribution for the club over the last nine years. It is now that the Whites are realising their all-time top goal scorer’s loss but the clock has already ticked.