Manchester United legend Cristiano Ronaldo has been backed to move into football club ownership instead of management when he retires in light of his recent criticism of his old team
Cristiano Ronaldo has been backed to buy a football club after he retires after his recent criticism of Man United(Image: TALKSPORT)
Cristiano Ronaldo has been tipped to buy his own football club following his recent criticism of Manchester United. Ronaldo has spoken out this week about the failure of the club’s hierarchy to take the right steps to return United to the pinnacle of the game.
In a candid interview with Piers Morgan, the five-time Ballon d’Or winner warned that head coach Ruben Amorim can’t perform miracles on his own. Amorim, who played with Ronaldo for Portugal’s national team, admitted in response that “mistakes” have been made, but stressed the importance of focusing on United’s future, rather than the club’s past.
It’s now been suggested that Ronaldo’s comments provide a hint that he’s more likely to opt to buy a football club instead of becoming a manager once he retires. The 40-year-old, who current plays for Saudi Pro League side Al Nassr, is hardly short of money after it was recently revealed by Bloomberg that he had become football’s first billionaire player.
Former Liverpool striker Dean Saunders has now said he believes owning a football club would be more attractive to Ronaldo as it will give him greater control than being a manager. Saunders, who previously managed Wolves and Wrexham, offered his thoughts while appearing on talkSPORT after claiming Ronaldo became frustrated with the attitude of his teammates during his second spell at United.
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“I think he’ll buy a club because you’ve then got a bit of control over what happens at the club when you’re in charge of it,” Saunders said. “But when you’re coaching players, you rely on players to make you look good. He relies on himself right now.
“I don’t think he’s having a go at Amorim. I know for a fact that he told ex-players that he couldn’t believe the attitude of the players he was playing with at Man United.
Ruben Amorim has responded to comments by his former international teammate Cristiano Ronaldo(Image: Mast Irham/EPA/REX/Shutterstock)
“If you’d done that in front of Sir Alex Ferguson, you’d never play again. I think he’s on about the culture at the club and Amorim is trying to say as well that he needs to get the culture right.”
Ronaldo’s current contract with Al-Nassr takes him through to the summer of 2027. He is also expected to star at next summer’s World Cup as he approaches the impressive feat of scoring 1,000 career goals.
Speaking at the Globe Soccer Awards in December 2024, Ronaldo made it clear that he does not plan to move into coaching when he retires. Instead, he said he could “maybe” see himself becoming a club owner, but only “when the right opportunity comes.”
Cristiano Ronaldo has expressed his opinion on Manchester United and Ruben Amorim this week(Image: Jose Manuel Alvarez Rey/Getty Images)
Ronaldo later went further, saying: “Mark my words, I will be the owner of a big club, for sure.” He also suggested he would want to take an active role in improving how a club is run, noting that if he ever owned a team like United, he would “make things clear and adjust what I think is bad there.”
Discussing Amorim’s time at Old Trafford to date during his interview with Morgan, Ronaldo said: “He’s doing his best. What are you going to do? Miracles? Miracles is impossible. We say in Portugal, ‘miracles is only in Fatima’, and he’s not going to do miracles.”
The “miracle of Fatima” refers to the events of October 13, 1917, where a crowd of people are said to have witnessed the “Miracle of the Sun”. It is claimed that, during the event, the sun appeared to spin, change colours, and fell to the earth before returning to its normal position.
When asked about the comments, Amorim said: “Of course, he knows and he has a huge impact in everything he says. What we need to focus on is the future. We know that we as a club made a lot of mistakes in the past and we are trying to change that. Let’s not focus on what happened.
“Let’s focus on what we are doing now and we are doing that. We are changing a lot of things in the structure, the way we do things and want the players to behave. We are doing that and we are improving, so let’s continue and forget the past.”
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