Real ready to sell Ronaldo as La Liga winds up

On Friday, the world woke up to news that Spanish football giants Real Madrid are ready to put their star player Cristiano Ronaldo up for sale for a reported 150-million-pounds. All England tabloids, led by Daily Mail were awash with reports that “news of the possible transfer has emerged after Ronaldo had a training ground row with Madrid manager Jose Mourinho”. To start with, Madrid paid a world-record fee of 80 million pounds to lure the Portuguese forward from Manchester United in 2009, and when you consider the fact that Real is never a selling club, offloading off Ronaldo after just two seasons, seems next to impossible, though not totally impossible. Fiorentino Perez, the Real Madrid president bought Ronaldo, along with Kaka, Benzema, and Alonso etcetera as his team’s answer to the dominance of traditional rivals Barcelona. But the Catalan side has continued to dominate Spanish football, while Madrid, despite the arrival of Jose Mourinho, the self-anointed “Special One”, appears as though they’d have to do a lot more than just assembling the best squad in the world, to stop Barcelona’s domination. Moneybags, Manchester City are being touted as Ronaldo’s next destination, as common sense point towards them as the only club with such kind of money (150-million-pounds) to through around. Reports show that, at Madrid, the former World Player of the Years commands a salary of more than 200,000 pounds a week, a figure which leaves just one or two clubs with the kind of financial muscle power to afford him. The story came just a day after Manchester City officials had just released a statement, indicating that they have no plans to go into the next transfer window with full force as they did during the last. So, when you put the two scenarios together, and the fact that, City are Manchester United’s eternal rivals, it’s had to see the man referred to in the Spanish press as CR9 donning the Sky Blue shirt—and I think he has a lot of respect for Sir Alex Ferguson and United fans. So, he can’t go to City. However, regardless of the speculations concerning his future in Spain, Ronaldo can become the highest scorer of all time in a Spanish league season if he scores against already relegated Almeria. The Portuguese has scored 38 goals this campaign, [equalling the record of Hugo Sanchez from 1989 and Telmo Zarra in 1951 when there were only 30 matches in a season]. Therefore, another goal will give Ronaldo the record on his own and given his recent form, the surprise will be if he doesn’t reach the milestone or if Mourinho will ignore the reported “training ground row” with his countryman and plays him altogether. Final day of Spanish La Liga With just one game remaining, there are still several minor questions to be answered, the most important of them being which side will be relegated to the second division, with six different sides fighting to avoid the drop. Real Zaragoza, Deportivo, Getafe, Osasuna, Real Sociedad and Mallorca are all in the mix and every team has its future in its own hands knowing that a win would assure survival, and defeat could spell relegation. Zaragoza would be safe with a win in Levante, while former Champions League side Deportivo will look for the points at home to a Valencia side that is already assured third place. Sociedad entertain fellow relegation rivals Getafe, while Osasuna will be hoping to avoid the drop with a home win over Villarreal. Already relegated Hercules and Sporting Gijon have nothing to play for, while league champions Barcelona will have one eye on next week’s Champions League final when they visit Malaga. nku78@yahoo.com