When Cristiano Ronaldo departed Juventus for a memorable return to Old Trafford and Manchester United, many wondered how the now 37-year-old would fair given the pace of the Premier League and whilst there were notable differences in how the Portuguese international approached games (compared to his first spell in England) he would certainly consider it a personal success with 24 goals being returned in 35 starts across all competitions.
It was a less than successful year for the Red Devil’s though with continuing managerial issues and with Erik ten Hag now in place for the coming 2022/23 campaign but no Champions League slot, Ronaldo has already made it pretty clear that he would like to move on again and two Serie A clubs have reportedly expressed an interest in wanting him to return to the Italian game and you might as well spin a Betway casino arabic roulette wheel in terms of predicting what happens next.
With over 100 goals for the Bianconeri in his three year spell with them previously everyone knows what he can do in Serie A, and it seemed the former World Player of the Year may well have been interested in AS Roma and Napoli’s interest in him, but this week it seems Ten Hag has put the block on any kind of transfer this summer.
Experienced serial winner Ronaldo is already set to miss the first part of United’s pre season tour to Thailand due to personal reasons, but in recent comments to the media their Dutch manager was very matter of fact about his immediate future.
“He is not with us due to personal issues. We are planning with Cristiano Ronaldo for this season. That is it. I am looking forward to working with him. Cristiano is not for sale. He is in our plans. We want success together.”
With Ronaldo’s absence from the tour (on top of him also missing the return to training at Carrington) simply fuelling rumours about his future at Old Trafford, Ten Hag went on to add that although he was unsure as to when Ronaldo would join up with the side for pre season preparations, they had already had a ‘good talk’ prior to the tour taking place but it did not sound like the captain’s armband would be used as a sweetener here, with him confirming that honour would continue to be held by England centre half Harry Maguire – despite his own form struggles in the 2021/22 campaign.
“I had a good talk. That is between Cristiano and me. What I can confirm is we had a really good conversation together. Harry Maguire will be captain. He has been captain for more than a year. He has achieved a lot of success. I have no doubts about this issue.”
With so much time left in the domestic transfer windows across Europe, undoubtedly this story will continue to run and run – particularly if the former European Championship winner does not more speedily return to the club for training – and with Napoli and Roma already linked, and undoubtedly given his massive wage demands and previous success, Juventus would be considered a hot favourite here if they were interested, there will probably be more Serie A links to come in the weeks ahead.
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