Manchester United have announced the signing of Cristiano Ronaldo from Juventus, the deal being subject to medicals and ironing out of personal terms. In a move that shocked the football world, the football icon has returned to the club where he first made his name.
Ronaldo was already a legend of the red devils having turned out for the club from 2003 to 2009 when he left for Real Madrid. During this period, he won a slew of trophies including three Premier League titles, a UEFA Champions League amongst others. He also picked up several individual accolades, chief among them the Ballon D’or and FIFA player of the year he won in 2008. He scored 118 goals in 292 appearances in his first stint at the club endearing himself to the fans for them as well as his skills and electric pace.
This might at face value seem like a fairy tale return that was bound to happen. In truth it was far more complex than that, infact less than 24 hours before he joined in the afternoon hours of Friday July 27, August 2021, it had seemed he would join United’s bitter rivals Manchester City instead.
As news emerged that the five time world player of the year would depart Juventus, Manchester City who were without a world class striker since the departure of Sergio Kun Aguero to Barcelona were immediately front-runners for his signature and some sources claimed the deal was already done. This caused a massive negative reaction among the Manchester United faithful with it being almost Unthinkable that their golden boy would join their crosstown rivals.
At the eleventh hour the deal with Man City stalled as Juventus wanted a transfer fee of 25 million Euros and Man City did not want to pay that in addition to Ronaldo’s massive wages. This allowed Man United who had been involved in subtle negotiations with Ronaldo’s agent Jorge Mendes as well as Juventus, to step in to quickly step in, pay the fee and complete the deal.
Manchester United will spend a lot of money on this deal with and transfer fee of about 24 million Euros and a reported wage 480,000 pounds a week but the deal owed as much if not more to the influence of United players both past and present. It was said that Manchester United icons such as Rio Ferdinand and Patrice Evra amongst others were instrumental in persuading Ronaldo to choose United over City. The impact of legendary Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson who is like a father figure to Ronaldo was massive according to sources. Bruno Fernandes was also said to be involved in persuading his Portuguese teammate to choose United and even posted a cheeky welcome message referring to himself as ‘Agent Bruno’.
In a wild transfer window, Manchester United have managed to capture one of football’s greatest ever players and one of the best in the world. Despite being 36, Ronaldo is showing no signs of waning and recorded 101 goals in 134 appearances for Juventus with 36 of them coming in his final season for the old lady. He will bring this extra ordinary goal scoring ability, winning mentality an unmatched work ethic as well as experience to the Man United fold.