Gary Neville makes Cristiano Ronaldo transfer claim and Man Utd fans disagree with him.
According to Gary Neville, Manchester United will let Cristiano Ronaldo depart the team this summer.
Since the Portuguese superstar submitted a shocking transfer request last month, speculation about the striker’s future has dominated United’s preseason preparations.
Ronaldo played his first warm-up match against Rayo Vallecano on Sunday after skipping the preseason tours of Thailand and Australia, but was removed at halftime following a contentious exchange with the new manager Erik ten Hag.
The five-time winner of the Ballon d’Or was seen leaving Old Trafford before the game ended, conduct that Ten Hag later called “inappropriate.”
Neville, a former captain of Manchester United, believes Ronaldo should be permitted to leave the team before the transfer window shuts on the most recent episode of Sky Bet’s The Overlap.
During Ronaldo’s first stint at Old Trafford, Neville, a teammate of the Portuguese player, remarked of the player, “Ronaldo’s achievements in football have gone beyond everything that anybody could have asked for and envisaged.”
He always will be remembered as one of the greatest footballers of all time. In 20 years, Manchester United’s summer activities will be forgotten.
But as a former Manchester United captain, I find it unpleasant to observe because I feel that the star player in the locker room is currently acting out.
“Over the past few years, it has occasionally happened that [Paul] Pogba’s agent — not necessarily Pogba — would constantly act out.
“You can’t let your star player run the show for a team. It is not yours. Therefore, when Sir Alex Ferguson transferred players in the past, it was because that player needed to be transferred.
“I am aware that Ronaldo’s fans at Manchester United want him to stay. But in my opinion, Manchester United should make it easier for Ronaldo to leave if he wants to.
Neville also claims he is worried about United’s summer transfer activities and thinks Ten Hag is not receiving enough backing from the team.
Tyrell Malacia from Feyenoord, Lisandro Martinez from Ajax, and Christian Eriksen on a free transfer have all joined the Red Devils, but Frenkie de Jong, who is Ten Hag’s top target, is still playing for Barcelona.
Neville agreed, saying, “I think he [Ten Hag] has had a really remarkable start, a confident start, in spite of the fact that his star player is playing up and he isn’t receiving off-the-field assistance from a team that can’t procure the players he desires.
“If you had told me two months ago that Manchester United would have Fred and [Scott] McTominay in midfield – I like both of them, and I believe that each of them gives their all for Manchester United – and that we’d have [Anthony] Martial up front, who, to be fair, every Manchester United supporter and coach had written off and believed he would be leaving – that would have been a lie. He is now the season’s center forward for us.
Neville thinks it’s embarrassing for United that they can’t get De Jong to sign a contract.
“It gets to the point where a signing that should be an exciting development for the team—I mentioned this about [Jadon] Sancho, and it’s the same with De Jong—where it becomes problematic. You lose interest in the signature since it takes so long “Neville was added.
“It almost starts to feel embarrassing a little bit. It is still taking place. The fact that they continue to have trouble crossing the finish line with signings genuinely worries me.”