You don’t need to be a genius in order to understand the situation between Cristiano Ronaldo and Erik ten Hag. Initially, the Dutch coach was clear with the Portuguese star by telling him he would play a small role in his system. As months kept going by, Cristiano Ronaldo managed to play a little bit and did his best to remain professional.
However, the star player’s competitive spirit and personality got the best of him last Wednesday. Leaving the pitch in a tantrum like that is something Cristiano Ronaldo is very familiar with, especially when he didn’t play. But then again, not playing is something rarely happened to Ronaldo.
Manchester United banish Cristiano Ronaldo from first team for Chelsea
For the longest time, Cristiano Ronaldo has remained as the key player of all the projects he’s been a part of. This was bound to change as he got older, it was inevitable. Deep down, most of us who enjoyed his incredible career are hoping he can return to some version of the player he was just a couple years back.
But Ten Hag is not helping Ronaldo by leaving him on the bench during important games. Before last Wednesday’s tantrum, we could still see how Ten Hag’s decision was purely technical.
Ten Hag reaches a breaking point with Ronaldo
A troubling report from tabloid The Sun, suggests that the Dutch manager has made a wild request about Cristiano Ronaldo’s contract. Take this with a grain of salt but if true, it means coach and player can no longer remain part ofthe same club. This is when a famous quote from Sir Alex Ferguson comes to mind, he said it in 2013 as he retired. The famous quote goes like this:
The moment a Manchester United player feels he’s bigger than the club, that’s exactly the time for him to leave.
With this in mind, the report from The Sun claims that Erik ten Hag can’t spend more time with Ronaldo and he wants the player to leave in January. There’s a problem though, Cristiano has an active contract until June, 2023. This report says that Ten Hag has demanded United to rip Ronaldo’s contract and leave him as a free agent if there are no suitors for him in January. A wild claim indeed.
Regardless if this report is true or not, Cristiano Ronaldo is not going to train with the team for the next three days. After that, Ten Hag himself made the decision to drop him off the squad to face Chelsea next weekend. The player himself apologized through his social media accounts but the damage is already done.