Cristiano Ronaldo has blasted Manchester United of ‘stopping the clock’ and achieving ‘zero’ progress since Sir Alex Ferguson retired in 2013.
Ronaldo left for Real Madrid in 2009 for a world record fee of £80m, only to return in 2021 to find United “behind Liverpool, Manchester City, and Chelsea.”
It was one of many damning assessments from Ronaldo in the first half of his 90-minute interview with Piers Morgan on TalkTv, in which he criticised Wayne Rooney for his criticism, backed former manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, spoke up about the agony of losing his newborn son earlier this year, and also blasted United’s young players for ‘not caring.’
‘Piers to be honest, when I signed for Manchester United I thought everything would have changed because it’s 13 years since I changed,’ he said.
‘I was in Real Madrid nine years and three in Juventus, and when I arrived I thought it would be different; the technology and infrastructures and everything.
‘I was a surprised in a bad way, because everything was the same, and you mention that Ole [Gunnar Solskjaer] was sacked, Michael Carrick assumed the job for two games, and everything was so fast.
‘The progress was zero. Since Sir Alex left, I saw no evolution in the club. Nothing had changed.’
‘So I knew that Manchester United wasn’t the same. But don’t see that it was so big a gap. So big things that go through by the last 10 years, and it was the thing that surprised me more, to be honest’
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Much has been said about the lack of progress made at United’s Carrington training ground and Old Trafford. Ronaldo has revealed that the club’s facilities are not up to his high standards and that the club is now “behind” its competition.
Ronaldo added: ‘At United, the progress was zero, in my opinion. To compare with Real Madrid and even Juventus, that they follow the rest of the world, so the technology, especially in terms of training, nutrition and conditions of, eat properly and to recover better than before – surprised me.
‘Manchester right now to compare with that club, I think it’s behind in my opinion, which is something that surprised me.
‘A club with this dimension should be the top of the tree in my opinion and they are not, unfortunately. They are not in that level. But I hope the next years they can reach to be in a top level.’
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