When Cristiano Ronaldo plays football, it’s all eyes on him.
Match-winner extraordinaire, the Portuguese certainly writes his own scripts. Whether it’s scoring a hat-trick to send his country to the World Cup finals, a penalty to win the Champions League or a 95th-minute winner to keep Manchester United alive in the competition, invariably Ronaldo dominates the headlines.
However, there’s a flip side to playing alongside one of the greatest to have ever laced up a pair of football boots.
Ronaldo loves the glory but doesn’t appear too keen to graft in order to get there.
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We only need to look at how much more complete Real Madrid look these days and how well Karim Benzema is playing to understand that, for all of his goals for Los Blancos, Ronaldo’s presence hindered team play to a huge degree.
According to the Daily Mail there have already been suggestions that he isn’t getting his hands dirty in a defensive sense at United, and The Athletic, via the Daily Mail, have Leonardo Bonucci’s words on how the Juventus dressing room is much more together, now that Ronaldo has left.
“Cristiano’s presence had a big influence on us. Just training with him gave us something extra but subconsciously players started to think his presence alone was enough to win games,” he said.
“We began to fall a little short in our daily work, the humility, the sacrifice, the desire to be there for your teammate day after day. Over the last few years, I think you could see that.”