Ex-Man United director busts myth over Cristiano Ronaldo and Ronaldinho transfer
Manchester United were in for Cristiano Ronaldo before Ronaldinho turned them down for Barcelona, according to Peter Kenyon.
Man United wanted to sign Ronaldinho in Kenyon’s last year at Old Trafford, but the move didn’t materialise, with the Brazilian superstar leaving Paris Saint-Germain for LaLiga instead.
Barca president Joan Laporta wanted to bring Man United’s David Beckham to the club, but the England star signed for Real Madrid instead. The Spanish giants then entered the race for Ronaldinho.
In the end, Barca outbid Man United with a €30million offer.
That summer, the Red Devils then snapped up Ronaldo as the marquee signing instead, leaving some fans to believe the then-Sporting Lisbon star joined only because Ronaldinho didn’t.
But ex-Man United chief executive Kenyon insists this wasn’t the case, stating they were in for him anyway, even before Ronaldinho said no and a deal was done for him before United played Sporting in a pre-season friendly.
“No, it wasn’t by chance,” he said, addressing those assumptions on Man United legend Rio Ferdinand’s ‘Rio Ferdinand Presents’ podcast.
“We’d done the deal for Ronaldo. We’d brought him in earlier than what we anticipated.”
When asked if Man United knew about Sporting’s young talent whilst being interested in Ronaldinho, he said: “Yeah, for sure.”
“I always thought we didn’t get Ronaldinho,” Ferdinand interjected, clearing up what he and many Man United fans believed happened. “And I remember [Sir Alex Ferguson] devastated on the training ground.
“‘He’s not going to come, he’s going to go Barca, think they’ve done us’. Then I didn’t hear any murmurings about anyone else.
“Then we go and play Sporting in the stadium, and we leave the stadium knowing we signed him. But I thought that was just reactive to that performance.”
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“Not at all,” Kenyon said. “So we come off the pre-season in America, go to Sporting, you’ve got to remember this, okay it was pre-season…”
Ferdinand interjected then, saying: “Yeah, he was unreal.”
“We’d done a deal for Ronaldo prior to that, against a lot of competition” Kenyon said. “And I was there to finish it. The plan was he would stay at Sporting for another 12 months.
“He wanted to play football and develop. Players need to play football to develop, not sit on first-team benches.
“And he was very clear about – he was 17, right. He still wanted to play every game, didn’t he? As everyone does.
“But he absolutely, in the first half, wiped the floor with us and I got a call. It was Roy Keane and Giggsy that made it quite clear we’ve got to take this boy home with us.
“So we stayed and we actually renegotiated that deal so he could come to United that year. It wasn’t a reaction to Ronaldinho.”
Quizzed on whether they still would have signed Ronaldo if the Ronaldinho move materialised, Kenyon said yes, but the former would have stayed at Sporting for another year.
Ronaldo went on to make 346 appearances for Man United across two spells.
He bagged 145 goals and 54 assists, as well as winning the Champions League, three Premier Leagues, two League Cups and an FA Cup.
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