Pedro Mendes: Humiliated Cristiano Ronaldo will leave United in New Year
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In the third part of an exlusive interview with Ladbrokes: Fanzone, ex-Tottenham, Portsmouth and Rangers midfielder Pedro Mendes discusses his former Portugal team-mate Cristiano Ronaldo.
Humiliated Cristiano will leave United in January
It’s a difficult situation between Cristiano Ronaldo and Manchester United. We don’t know exactly what went on behind closed doors in the summer, whether there was an offer on the table for him, whether Erik ten Hag wanted him to stay or leave. A lot of things are coming out, but at the end of the day if the manager wants him, he stays.
The difficulty comes because Cristiano Ronaldo is not a squad player. You can’t have someone like him in your team as a squad player. It’s hard enough at times for a normal player to sit on the bench. The worst thing you can do for any footballer is have him warm up all game just to come on at the end for five minutes. It’s embarrassing.
For a young player, I get it. Give him minutes at the end of a game, let him build up his confidence. But for someone like Cristiano? It’s humiliating. It’s difficult for him to take.
But now he’s playing a little more for United and everything looks a little more normal. But I think if the right club and the right project comes along in January, he’ll leave. That’s what I think.
One word to sum up Cristiano on international duty: normal
Cristiano was always a great professional on international duty. He wanted his team-mates to be at the top of their game, and the levels he put in himself in training, he also expected the rest of the players to reach – and we did it. He’s a good guy, he was very normal whenever we met up on international duty. You couldn’t say there was anything out of the ordinary with him – he was just normal.
Before the 2010 World Cup, we were in Portugal together for three weeks as a team, training and preparing before heading out to South Africa, and Cristiano was just a normal team-mate. That’s what I liked about him. You could see he was a champion in everything he did, but ultimately he respected his team-mates and always came across as just the same as all of us.
When it came to down-time in that World Cup, whatever it was we found ourselves playing as a team, none of us wanted to lose. That’s including Cristiano. He wanted to be the best at whatever it was, but that was the same with all of us. I don’t know anyone who likes losing. But it’s even more important in those situations, because there’s the fear that the joke is going to be on you if you lose. It’s healthy competition, which is always a good thing in those camps.
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