Umm... Difficult to believe that narrative. If Bale had been sold , and he got the deal he was looking for he would have been here , no two doubts about it. Funny thing is he is still scoring goals for fun, that too for a defensive team like Juventus while we are struggling to score goals.
We offered him the same amount just based on performances and not a guarantee like Juvetus. Plus there's the other theory that he wanted the club to foot the bill for his tax issues. I don't see how Bale's situation had any bearing on Ronaldo specifically. While I'm not sure how much better we'd be this season with just adding Ronaldo, I will say that the failure of the president to replenish the squad adequately was undeniable.
Hold one one second.. did you not just see he scored a hat trick against Atletico in a deciding knockout CL match? and are you also not unaware that Juve has a midfield that pales in comparison to ours...
Relax because the issues we had for this entire season would not have been completely rectified by one player and this is assuming we went through the same manager musical chairs nonsense. Far too many players in this squad have been going through the motions in their worst possible form for me to assume that Ronaldo alone would somehow have us drowning in success by himself.
yeah ok.. remind me how many chances we could not put away against Barcelona..and how many chances he needed today to score a hat trick.
We had Ronaldo (who was a year younger) last season and were pretty much a non-factor in the league (and were out of the cup at the hands of Leganes). For large stretches of last season, Ronaldo wasn't his normal lethal self and I'm pretty sure that we can look back at many matches during that league campaign where a performance from him like today would have been needed. Maybe the past two weeks goes differently if he was here but that's all speculation. I know people are getting hyped on his performance today but you are massively understating the issues we've had this season with your overreaction.
I don't even think a player of Cristiano's calibre was needed to score against Barca.. We simply didn't have anyone who was good enough.. There are other players out there capable of putting away easy chances.. The overreaction is to you when making the claim that if we had Cr7 in the team things would have been the same.. And by the way Cristiano did not feature against Leganes in Copa del Rey.. the team who could not outscore this bottom of the table Leganes team under Zidane was composed by Asensio, Isco, Benzema, Llorente, Lucas V & Kovacic.
He desperately wanted to leave spain due to his Hacienda issues. In his mind he thinks that spain is ungrateful for everything he does (?). The deal he was looking for? Oh well maybe public apologies from Hacienda and Flo giving him more money than messi. He could end like a living legend but choosed to leave like a spoiled kid. Really disappointing. Was lucky enough that Flo acted like a gentleman. He deserved a president like psg Nasser
Benzema & Asensio scored a goal each against Leganes during that tie, not their fault that Real Madrid conceded 2 goals (one of them was basically a gift after a ridiculous slip from Nacho).
Never said that things would have been exactly the same. I said I'm not certain how much better things would have been because our issues involve many positions and players. I was quite clear on that so I'm not sure what you're talking about. And I know Ronaldo wasn't involved in the cup matches, I only included that to highlight that we had problems overall with the squad last season as well. We should have more than enough quality in our squad to beat Leganes without Ronaldo.
It always happens, especially if the team isn’t doing well, one game seems to hypothetically define what “could be” for our whole season, nothing new there, our league form was and continues to be atrocious, meh, good luck to Ronaldo but (especially with ZZ back and some refreshing of the squad) i for one am looking forward not back at this time
Ronaldo had an usually slow start to the league campaign last year which was anomalous to the norm. He likely would have been in good form this season from the beginning as evidenced by how well he started at Juve despite playing in a new team and league and under defensive tactics. And Perez only brought in his offer to Ronaldo at the last minute to save face when he was basically already about to move to Juventus - a deal that was less than what they were offering (the 30M would only be reached through incentives).
That was not my intent. As we saw last season we were bad and finished way behind Barca in la liga.. and I’ve also said here that we were lucky in CL. I just think it is hyperbole to insinuate that with Cris in the team you are not sure things would have been any better .. that is basically saying CR7 adds zero net value. I am not talking about thropies, never said that, but he would have certainly made a difference in some games where we lacked determination and goals. And I am saying this as a non-CR7 fan..
Yes, it's that simple. A player of Ronaldo's caliber alone would have probably made that much of a difference.
Let me say this, I'm talking more about actual trophies. Maybe we score more goals and maybe some results are much different but I just can't say for certain with the significant drop off that we saw in quite a few players, persistent issues that we've had for the past few seasons even ignoring Ronaldo's presence and us being on our third manager in a season that we would have ended with any silverware. I think there were too many factors working against us that Ronaldo's quality alone would not outweigh.
If we just had sold Bale and got Mbappe, when we could have,and kept Ronaldo, . we really would have been in a much different spot than we find ourselves in now. Zidane wanted changes ( Hazard, Pogba) to which Perez kept on saying that we have the best squad in the world , he was saying the same even after the debacle of JLo. It is after all this that he saw changes are needed. Infinitely more difficult challenge for ZZ now, I hope he has assurances that he won't be judged in the first year itself, and will be given proper time to set the ship in the correct path.
Less difficult than last summer because according to medias, right now, he can decide what he wants. It was not the case last summer.
Some ways less, some ways more. Bale was more "sellable" last season and he's been declining in value for years now and I doubt some big clubs would even take him if they were paid. I don't think his transfer is going to be as easy as anyone hope's; even if Bale decides he wants out, finding "the right club" may prove difficult. Hazard's transfer might not happen if Chelsea get a transfer ban, but last summer he was definitely game for the right price. Plus we had the Cristiano money burning a hole Flo's pocket and he splurged it on a retractable stadium roof. So two high priority transfers going in both directions that would have been relatively straight forward a year ago are now complicated by changes in circumstances. Easy for Zidane to ask for the moon and the stars but it's going to cost the club the ground their standing on.
Perez showed CR that no man is above the club, and there is some sense into standing your ground or to keeping to the club standards. the problem with what Perez did, was that Perez know about football as much as I know about knitting. he only looks and remembers the last game. in his mind, after the CL final where Bale came from the bench and scored two amazing goals (regardless how bad the Liverpool GK was), Bale was the best player on the planet and that game only showed why Zidane was wrong on Bale (according to Perez's mind), so when he went to deal with CR his mindset was "go fu(k yourself, I got Bale, the best player on the planet and I don't really need you". that way of thought, literally fu(ked up this whole season. there's no other way around this.
Anti-Florentino Pérez banners removed from Santiago Bernabéu https://t.co/UPDgezhnNT pic.twitter.com/TMczCM2HjU— AS USA (@English_AS) March 17, 2019
Taking us back to memory lane a bit, although this team hasn’t won much together, Perez’s ability to get a collection of stars together was something else.