Cristiano Ronaldo is threatened with an inglorious farewell from the Portuguese national team after the escalated dispute and hasty departure from the camp. The 41-year-old superstar wants to inform the public about the exact reasons for his decision to fly to Madrid by private jet one day before the international match against Denmark.
The Portuguese sports paper “O Jogo” already headlined: “Cristiano Ronaldo has made an irrevocable decision: he will no longer play for Portugal.” 234 international matches, 146 goals. And is that supposed to be it?
Ronaldo himself at least suggested as much in an initial statement. "Now it's time to wish Portugal and all my teammates good luck, without exception," he wrote: "After the national coach's press conference and following a conversation with the president of the Portuguese Football Association, I made the decision to leave the national team's training camp."
“In due course,” Ronaldo continued, “he will tell all Portuguese people the truth about the reasons that led me to leave the national team, to which I have always devoted myself with full commitment.”
Cristiano Ronaldo's sister complains on Instagram
At the start of the Nations League against Wales, Ronaldo was substituted after just over an hour. In the second game he didn't play for a minute against Norway - the first time in 18 years - and immediately disappeared into the dressing room. Portugal won both games. Before today's third match against Denmark in Parken Copenhagen, coach Jorge Jesus announced that Ronaldo would not be in the starting line-up again. Jesus said he would probably put storm rival Gonçalo Ramos (AC Milan) in the starting line-up again.
"Ronaldo? I don't know what's going to happen in the game. No idea. If I need him, he'll come in. If I don't need him, he won't come in," Jesus said, according to Portuguese media. He also reported on a conversation Ronaldo had with him and with the Portuguese association boss after the game against Norway. “He didn’t come to clarify anything, because there was nothing to clarify,” Jesus said.
Ronaldo probably saw it differently. “CR7 would have deserved more respect,” wrote his sister Elma Aveiro on Instagram in her story and poisoned: “We are jealous, dismissive, ignorant and deserve to fall back into the mediocrity that we always had in football before CR7.”
On August 20, 2003, Ronaldo played his first international match. Just under a year later he made it to the European Championship final in his own country with the national team, but lost it to Greece.
In 2016 - even though he had to leave the field injured during the game - he achieved the greatest success with the Portuguese selection by winning the European Championship in France with a win against the hosts. Not just since the World Cup in the USA, Canada and Mexico in the summer, many have been critical of his remaining in the national team.
Ronaldo's contract with Al-Nassr in Saudi Arabia is still valid for almost a year. Jorge Jesus was his trainer there from July 2024 to the end of June this year.
