At the start of the previous season, Ronaldo, then 36, signed a two-year contract tying his future to Manchester United. But after a year, Ronaldo reportedly asked the United board to give up their rights to him in the event that a reasonable offer were to come in.
Unquestionably, one of the best footballers of all time is Cristiano Ronaldo. However, he was unable to save Manchester United from finishing last in the race for a Champions League spot during his second stint at the club. Ronaldo is rumored to have submitted a transfer request, which might compel United to start from scratch again as the extent of his own contribution is continuously contested.
What effect has Ronaldo had on Manchester United during his second tenure there?
At the start of the previous season, Ronaldo, then 36, signed a two-year contract tying his future to Manchester United. But after a year, Ronaldo reportedly asked the United board to give up their rights to him in the event that a reasonable offer were to come in. Several British media outlets have reported that a Champions League club effectively competing in the latter stages is the demand for Ronaldo. It is a demand that resulted from United's failure to qualify for Europe's top club competition and a slow start to the forthcoming season's transfer market.
Although the Portuguese striker scored 24 goals last season, it's still unclear how he performed for the team. Was he to blame for United's failure to qualify for the Champions League? Or was he the only success throughout a disastrous season?
Reasons for signing Ronaldo
Ronaldo exceeded 20 goals for the 16th consecutive season. Although the expense at which it was achieved is impressive, that is where the actual problem resides.
During the 2020–21 campaign, United faced one significant criticism: the fact that then–manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer had authorized the sale of Romelu Lukaku without having any chance of acquiring a replacement striker.Instead, Anthony Martial, Marcus Rashford, Mason Greenwood, Bruno Fernandes, and Edinson Cavani were tasked with playing the frontmen. United scored 121 goals in all competitions, which was a record for them over the previous 14 seasons, defying every expert's prediction that goals would just not come. In total, Fernandes, Rashford, Cavani, and Greenwood scored 77 of those goals.
Then, at the start of the previous campaign, United swooped in on Jadon Sancho, giving their attack a crucial addition and effectively meeting their season-long need for an attacker.
Ronaldo's transfer market availability and his nearly moving to Manchester City tricked United into purchasing a player they didn't need.Any club Ronaldo joins will be filled with the aroma of winning and goals. But the underlying cause of United's 2021–22 season failure rests in what the club was forced to give up in exchange.
pressing problems
Because their primary striker would not press, United's style, which was focused on pressing lanes between an opponent's midfield and defense, suddenly became about relinquishing that space after a young core of attackers who had scored a record amount of goals was dropped.
Ronaldo has been scoring goals at such a rate for years that extra defensive demands have never been necessary.However, the lack of defensive effort becomes apparent when the team's goal total drops from the high 40s to the mid-20s. He averaged 6.6 pressures per 90 minutes for Manchester United last season, which put him towards the bottom of the strikers' list. An excellent pressure striker would apply 20 pressures on average per 90 minutes.
Football in 2022 punishes teams harshly if their players don't pressurize the spaces of the opposition. Despite scoring 24 goals, Ronaldo fails miserably to exert much pressure on the opponents' gaps. The absence of pressure results in more time spent with the ball, which further results in the opposition team's shape and possession remaining intact. The most valuable asset a top team can have, according to Ronaldo, is time on the ball.
The targets
It's great that Ronaldo had 24 goals and three assists in his first season back at United, but it's also important to consider how those goals were scored. In or after March, when the race for a Champions League spot was all but over, he scored nine of his 18 league goals. In two hat-tricks against Norwich and Tottenham, six of those nine goals were scored.
Ronaldo's goal slump in the middle of the season was a big factor in why United failed to qualify for the Champions League. Ronaldo's goal drought, according to ESPN Stats and Information, lasted 537 minutes, beginning with a 0-1 loss to Wolves on January 3 and ending with a 2-0 victory over Brighton. 8 of the 24 rounds he fired were on target.
setting the catastrophe class
Ronaldo left Real Madrid for Juventus and Manchester United, two teams where his major role and occupation of specific places on the field just caused chaos among his own players.
It was against Alvaro Morata at Juventus. The highly intelligent striker from Spain prefers to cut towards his right before taking a shot and plays on the left side of the pitch. For the majority of his career, Ronaldo was a left winger, but in his later years at Real Madrid and later at Juventus, he began to play as a central striker who drifted into the box from the left. Eventually, Morata was expelled from Juventus because he was unable to compete with Ronaldo's productivity.
In the opposition box at United this past season, Ronaldo might be located anywhere in the left or center, which are often occupied and well-utilized by Rashford and Fernandes.
Under the influence of one of the best players to ever play the game, Rashford, who had 21 goals and 13 assists in all competitions, and Fernandes, who had 28 goals and 18 assists the previous season, merely withered. Ronaldo took their places, but despite his brilliance, he couldn't make up for the 49 goals and 31 assists they meticulously put together the season before.
An attempt by United to reconstruct itself, which needed a few minor pieces here and there to compete at the highest level, failed as its prodigal son proved to be its worst weakness. Now that he has made a transfer request, Ronaldo gives United the choice of either keeping him and hope that the previous season was an anomaly, or letting the CR7 train depart from Manchester and concentrating on the progress made the season prior.
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