Cristiano Ronaldo departed Manchester United in 2022 in a bitter way - but he's been backed to return to the club
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Cristiano Ronaldo has been backed to make a shock return to Manchester United in the future, despite leaving in acrimonious circumstances nearly two years ago.
After re-signing for Manchester United in 2021, Cristiano Ronaldo enjoyed a strong first season in which he scored 24 goals in 38 appearances in all competitions. Erik ten Hag's arrival at the club in 2022 caused tension, though, with Ronaldo unhappy at being used more sparingly by the Dutchman.
Then, before heading off to the 2022 World Cup, Ronaldo conducted a controversial interview with Piers Morgan criticising Ten Hag and the club. That signalled the end of his time with the Red Devils for the second time, mutually agreeing to terminate his contract as he joined Al-Nassr in January 2023.
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Now 39, Ronaldo's best years of his playing career are clearly behind him. But while he might not be able to offer Manchester United anything from a playing perspective, his former team-mate Louis Saha believes the Portuguese forward could still make a return to the club in some capacity in the future.
"Cristiano Ronaldo has the passion and dedication to return to Manchester United one day, that could be as a coach or even a manager," Saha told TVSporten. "His second spell didn’t end how everyone had hoped and you can see why that frustrated him, he didn’t see the same formula and didn’t see the passion from young players that he had been used to seeing.
"Now he will know that he needs to find a new way to communicate when he becomes a coach, which maybe isn’t as harsh or direct as it was when he was at the club.
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Ronaldo and Ten Hag fell out (Image credit: Getty Images)
"He will work out how to be successful and use all his knowledge to do that, we’ve seen Roy Keane go into management and have success. Cristiano will understand what he needs to do as a manager and I see no reason why he wouldn’t be a success."
Ronaldo, though, has expressed in the past that he won't go into coaching. Speaking in 2019, while still at Juventus, he highlighed his lack of desire to end up in the dugout - though he still left the door ajar for that to change.
"Right now, I'm not interested in becoming a coach, but maybe one day I will be bored and I will feel like it," he told DAZN Italy. "Never say never."
Ronaldo is still in Saudi Arabia (Image credit: Getty Images)
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Ryan is a staff writer for FourFourTwo, joining the team full-time in October 2022. He first joined Future in December 2020, working across FourFourTwo, Golf Monthly, Rugby World and Advnture's websites, before eventually earning himself a position with FourFourTwo permanently. After graduating from Cardiff University with a degree in Journalism and Communications, Ryan earned a NCTJ qualification to further develop as a writer while a Trainee News Writer at Future.
