Cristiano Ronaldo is receiving heavy criticism for his competitive debut. He seems to be a ghost on the pitch, according to reactions to his performance

Saudi Arabia has had the most watched league match in history. That’s because on Sunday Cristiano Ronaldo started his first league game since moving to Al-Nassr. The famous Portuguese has come in for harsh criticism

Cristiano Ronaldo has played his debut competitive match for Al-Nassr. His team celebrated a slender 1-0 win over Al-Ettifaq. Anderson Talisca scored the only goal of the game after half an hour of play.

However, this was not Ronaldo’s first game in his new job. Last week, a selection of stars from the Al-Nassr and Al-Hilal teams played a closely watched friendly against PSG stars led by Lionel Messi.

Individually, the Portuguese megastar came out the better of the mini-duel, even though he and his teammates left the pitch as losers.

Ronaldo scored two goals and, quite logically, fuelled the already extreme expectations of his future performances even more.

However, for his first competitive match, he is receiving mainly a lot of criticism on social media. According to fans, he didn’t move around the pitch well at all. He was losing balls and was zero in duels.

“He’s done. Barely moved on the pitch,” one fan tweeted. “It’s like he was a ghost on the field,” another critical comment read.

For Ronaldo, the standard for his evaluation is pretty simple. If he scores goals, he is held aloft. If he doesn’t, he gets a huge wave of criticism. Of course, with his reputation and how the local league is perceived by football fans, expectations are even higher.

In short, the legendary Portuguese will be under the scrutiny of fans and critics around the world. Expectations are heightened by the fact that Ronaldo was captain of the team in his very first game.

Source: DailyMail