02 CRISTIANO RONALDO
A relentless desire to be recognised as the best has driven Ronaldo to glorious heights, and he won’t stop until he’s settled the age-old Messi debate once and for all. By Sam Pilger
On one of his first days at Manchester United in the summer of 2003, an 18-year-old Cristiano Ronaldo strolled into the club’s gym and approached one of their fitness coaches, Mick Clegg.
“I was sat there on my own, and he walks in dead early, around 8am, way before anyone else is there,” recalled Clegg. “He came up to me and said, ‘I want to be the best player in the world… no, I am going to be the best player in the world. I want you to help me.’”
Ronaldo was determined to make this happen by whatever means necessary; staying for hours in the gym, wearing weights on his ankles during sessions and taking ice baths in the middle of the night, all to create a physique to make him the best.
“The guy isn’t right in the head – I’ve never seen anyone train like it,” said former Portugal team-mate Deco. “It’s not easy to be like that… he goes to insane lengths as he always wants to be the best.”
This relentless desire to be recognised as the best has driven Ronaldo for the last 17 years, guiding his career from Lisbon to Turin, via Manchester and Madrid.
But one club in one country was never going to be enough, his all-consuming ambition would not allow it. He wanted to conquer it all.
It would have delighted Ronaldo to hear how former boss Alex Ferguson weighed in to the eternal debate about who is greater between him and Lionel Messi.
“There is a difference between Messi and Ronaldo and I’ll tell you what it is,” said Ferguson. “I think Messi is a Barcelona player but Ronaldo could be playing for Stockport County and he would score a hat-trick.”
While Messi’s greatness is confined to the Camp Nou, Ronaldo has now excelled at the biggest club in each of the world’s three best leagues.
After emerging at Sporting, Ronaldo quickly moved to Manchester United for £12.24 million, but there was always an implicit understanding within the club that they were only a stepping-stone for him. He was just passing through. As it was once observed, Ronaldo and United had a rocky marriage, but the sex was great.
At first he was a gawky teenager, “the wee show-off” said Fergie: a blur of step-overs and tricks; supremely talented, but still learning. In his first three years he scored 27 goals, but in the next three he’d net 91 as he bulked up and emerged as first the best player in the Premier League and then the best player in the world, confirmed with his first Ballon d’or in 2008.
It could be argued United had never seen a better player in their history, as Ronaldo’s genius helped to deliver three consecutive Premier League titles and two consecutive trips to the Champions League final, beating Chelsea in 2008 but losing to Barça in 2009.
The moment United had been expecting finally arrived in 2009 when Ronaldo joined Real Madrid for a world-record £80 million. The Bernabeu had always been the stage he’d been auditioning for.
The numbers he racked up over nine seasons in the Spanish capital, making him the club’s all-time leading scorer, are staggering: 311 goals in 292 La Liga games, 105 goals in 101 Champions League appearances, and overall 450 goals in 438 outings in all competitions.
Yet his time in Spain would conjure just two La Liga titles, although this was more than compensated for by a haul of four Champions Leagues, three Club World Cups, and four more Ballons d’or.
Some were surprised to see Ronaldo walk out on Real last year, but he’d done all he could and wanted to test himself in another top European league at Juventus.
So far this season he has not disappointed, leading their scoring chart, guaranteeing himself a Serie A winner’s medal and, at the time of writing, remaining on course for a sixth Champions League title.
“He’s obsessed with being better than Messi,” former team-mate Ryan Giggs has said. The debate will rage on, but this is perhaps Ronaldo’s greatest achievement; not the goals or trophies, but the fact that in the same era as Lionel Messi, he’s made so many seriously doubt whether the Argentine really is the best.