Ronaldo in the Brazilian league? He’s too expensive to be on the bench, jokes Flamengo boss

An undignified end to a career? Cristiano Ronaldo hasn’t had it easy this season. He wanted to leave, he wasn’t allowed to. Partly because no one was obviously interested in him or could afford him. And now he’s being “made fun of” in faraway Brazil.

His era seems to be ending. Cristiano Ronaldo has scored just three goals this season. He’s scored twice against Sheriff Tiraspol and once against Everton. However, he doesn’t have a completely solid place in Manchester United’s lineup and his performances have been mainly based on scoring goals for quite some time now.

In recent years, it has often been questioned whether Ronaldo is rather detrimental to his team. It started mainly with his transfer to Juventus, where the Portuguese was still shining, but the Bianconeri started to suffer after his arrival. Club legends blamed him for that.

But after a spectacular return to England, things are not the same from an individual point of view either. He was the Red Devils’ top scorer in his first season, but when he wasn’t scoring goals, he faced criticism for his contribution to the team. And now he’s not scoring many of those goals either.

He reportedly wanted to leave this summer. But the club refused to let him go for less. Other teams weren’t too keen on Ronaldo either. So either there was no money for him or they were worried about his influence on the squad and lack of contribution.

What’s next? Brazil is not on offer, Flamengo boss is clear

The 37-year-old Portuguese is thus facing a very undignified situation. He is now being linked with a move away from Europe. Inter Miami, the team owned by David Beckham, is said to be interested. Rather surprisingly, however, there have also been reports of interest from Brazilian side Flamengo.

It’s worth noting that Flamengo have been linked with various stars on several occasions. Neymar, for example. Now, in the famous Brazilian team we could find very well-known names to European fans. Be it David Luiz, Felipe Luis, Diego, Arturo Vidal or Gabriel Barbosa.

Flamengo, in short, has a very strong squad, which this year deservedly went for the trophy in the South American equivalent of the Champions League, the Copa Libertadores. And that Ronaldo is still to be reinforced? That’s not likely for a number of reasons.

In the attack, it is the aforementioned Barbosa who reigns supreme, who has scored 29 goals this season, or his partner Pedro, who stopped at the same level, only adding five more assists (10).

Flamengo boss Rodolfo Landim also commented on the speculation. “I don’t know where this speculation came from, but journalists must have a lot of creativity. First of all, I have to ask, what position would I bring him to? He would have to be on the bench,” he opined on the Papo Reto podcast.

“I don’t know if it’s true, but I read that he would be offered $242 million for a two-year deal. That’s $10 million a month. That’s a value well above our salary possibilities. Just to be a replacement for Pedro and Barbosa? We can’t. We’re not going to do crazy things like that,” Landim said.

Source: Papo Reto Podcast, Transfermarkt, Flamengo