Cristiano Ronaldo gave Manchester United the perfect boost to their Champions League final preparations last night by announcing his intention to stay at Old Trafford.
The World Player of the Year was widely expected to renew his pursuit of a “dream” transfer to Real Madrid this summer after the match against Barcelona in Rome on Wednesday. However, as revealed by The Times last week, he has concluded that his career would be best served by staying put for the next 12 months.
Interviewed yesterday by one of the same Spanish radio stations that he used to flirt brazenly with Real last summer, Ronaldo said: “At the moment I’m only thinking about the [Champions League] final, independently of what will happen to me or my team-mates next season.
“I’m sure [Florentino] Pérez [who is expected to be elected Real president next month] would create an incredible team at Madrid, but at the moment I’m at United and I don’t care about what happens there. I only care about what will happen next season at Manchester United.”
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United will now gauge whether Ronaldo’s commitment is genuine by seeing whether he would be willing to discuss an extension to his £120,000-a-week contract, which runs until June 2012.
Ronaldo’s decision has coincided with indications from Madrid that Pérez is more eager to sign Xabi Alonso from Liverpool, Kaká from AC Milan and Franck Ribéry from Bayern Munich than spend more than £75 million to sign the Portugal forward, who would also demand in excess of £160,000 a week. An outline agreement of a deal to take Ronaldo, 24, to Madrid was discussed this season by his agent, Jorge Mendes, and Ramón Calderón, but Calderón’s resignation as Real president in January over allegations of vote-rigging meant that the agreement was meaningless unless it was passed on to, and accepted by, his successor.
Pérez is far less convinced about the merits of signing Ronaldo, who in turn has re-evaluated his commitment to United as they close in on a second successive European Cup, having already won a third consecutive Premier League title.
Despite his histrionics at being substituted by Sir Alex Ferguson in this month’s derby victory over Manchester City, Ronaldo has belatedly acknowledged his debt to a manager who paid £12.2 million for him six years ago and under whose guidance he has developed into one of the most coveted players in the world.
There may also be a financial aspect to his decision. Nike, the sportswear company, is willing to discuss a new and vastly improved contract, but the deal is thought to have been contingent on him staying with United rather than joining Real, whose kit is made by adidas.
Ferguson, meanwhile, believes that retaining the European Cup next week, which no team have done since AC Milan in 1990, would surpass anything he has accomplished as a manager. He told The Times: “Winning back-to-back Champions League titles would be the best achievement of my career, no question. It has to be.
“When I won my first Champions League against Bayern Munich [in 1999] I said: ‘Good, that’s out of the road’ because that was always a criticism of me. Then we went through a dry zone and we had to wait another nine years to do it. Now we’re in a situation where we’re in another final already, which is phenomenal.”
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