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Cristiano Ronaldo

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Sandikan

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it doesnt matter mate, they wont listen, years from now they will repeat that Ronaldo won this CL all by himself
is like when i try to explain that maradona didnt win the 1986 world cup alone
or that what he did at napoli was done before by verona and sampdoria
or that july in south america is cold and thus, the heat is not an excuse for european teams to never win a WC here

caftards want to believe what they want to believe
How "cold" is Brazil going to be this summer then?
Cold by Equator standards?
 

Stack

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it doesnt matter mate, they wont listen, years from now they will repeat that Ronaldo won this CL all by himself
is like when i try to explain that maradona didnt win the 1986 world cup alone
or that what he did at napoli was done before by verona and sampdoria
or that july in south america is cold and thus, the heat is not an excuse for european teams to never win a WC here

caftards want to believe what they want to believe
yeah its cold in Argentina in June/July but not up in Manaus etc for Europeans. I have been to both Argentina and Brazil in July and its hotter than most Europeans are used to. Add in the humidity factor and its hot.
 

Conrad

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it doesnt matter mate, they wont listen, years from now they will repeat that Ronaldo won this CL all by himself
is like when i try to explain that maradona didnt win the 1986 world cup alone
or that what he did at napoli was done before by verona and sampdoria
or that july in south america is cold and thus, the heat is not an excuse for european teams to never win a WC here

caftards want to believe what they want to believe
It might be cold for South America but it's still a lot hotter than most European teams are used to playing in. Add in the fact that temperature is only one part of the massively different climate.

I'm not even sure why European teams need an excuse? There have only been 4 tournaments in South America and the first of those only had 4 European teams. South American teams relatively poor record of 1 win in 10 European tournaments is more statistically significant while still being pretty much meaningless.
 
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Marcosdeto

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Unlike his team mates? His team mates won the game, he played poorly then tucked away the 4th goal from a penalty.
It might be cold for South America but it's still a lot hotter than most European teams are used to playing in. Add in the fact that temperature is only one part of the massively different climate.

I'm not even sure why European teams need an excuse? There have only been 4 tournaments in South America and the first of those only had 4 European teams. South American teams relatively poor record of 1 win in 10 European tournaments is more statistically significant while still being pretty much meaningless.
i can assure you both, that the spain or italy world cup where played in hotter conditions
 

barros

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i can assure you both, that the spain or italy world cup where played in hotter conditions
The problem is not the heat, when I moved to New Jersey I was surprised why I was so uncomfortable when the temperatures hit 85's and up when I was used to 90's over the summer and sometimes even more, something we don't have in Portugal over the summer - humidity (not at the levels we have here in NJ). I didn't last 15 minutes playing a game against a Brazilian team and even some of my team were Mexicans and they last about a hour. The Brazilians played a very slow game and we approach them at high speed :nervous:
 

Relevated

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He went nuts when Bale scored the winner for La Copa Del Rey.
Pfft, more like he tried to get the headlines. In all seriousness though, he does celebrate but some peoples interpretation of him is always a little off. He doesn't get the credit sometimes.
 

Scarlett Dracarys

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it doesnt matter mate, they wont listen, years from now they will repeat that Ronaldo won this CL all by himself
is like when i try to explain that maradona didnt win the 1986 world cup alone
or that what he did at napoli was done before by verona and sampdoria
or that july in south america is cold and thus, the heat is not an excuse for european teams to never win a WC here

caftards want to believe what they want to believe
Cold in South America in July ? I don't know what part of south America you're from but I grew up right next to Brazil. My country borders Brazil and Venezuela and it's terribly hot in July.
 

Marcosdeto

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Yeah its going to be nice and cool with no humidity in Manaus..... some of us have been to Brazil in june/july, please dont try and bullshit us.
yes, i'm paid by the brazilian football authorities to bullshit redcafe

i'm 008

Cold in South America in July ? I don't know what part of south America you're from but I grew up right next to Brazil. My country borders Brazil and Venezuela and it's terribly hot in July.
i'm from argentina, in july two thirds of the country are under snow
brazil is huge, of course in the north is hotter than in the south, but not as hot as many people say
 

Needham

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(From the New York Times)

Ronaldo’s Toughest Move

Long Before Real Madrid and the Champions League, a Reluctance to Leave Madeira

  • In Lisbon, though, Ronaldo had not found the sanctuary Sousa expected. Ronaldo missed his father, Jose Dinis, who was a gardener (and the equipment manager for Andorinha’s senior team). He missed his mother, Dolores, and his brother and his two sisters. He missed chasing frogs in the dried gullies with his cousin. He missed the familiarity of living in a neighborhood where most of the roofs are an Iberian orange and the streets are one-and-half-cars wide and no one needs to know the names of the roads because every family lives in the same house it has always lived in.

    He missed, as much as anything, hearing people talk the way he did; in Lisbon, the other boys in the academy taunted him mercilessly, making fun of his Madeiran accent.

    He did not want to return to the continent. Sousa and Jose Dinis, who died in 2005, were not sure what to do.

    “We convinced his mother to talk to him,” Sousa said, shaking his head. “He always listened to his mother. Then we put him in the car and drove him right to the airport. It was difficult, but he went back.”

    Photo

    A photo of Ronaldo as a boy hangs at a bar of the Andorinha club, Ronaldo's first team.CreditSamuel Aranda for The New York Times
    Sousa smiled. “It is good that he did, no?” he said.

    Sousa laughed then, acknowledging his understatement. The bar he was standing at was next to a soccer field with a large photograph of a young Ronaldo, wearing the colors of Andorinha, plastered above the entrance. This field did not exist when Ronaldo was a boy — his first field was a little ways down the hill and “did not even have grass, only dirt,” according to Rui Santos, the president of Andorinha when Ronaldo played there. On this island, though, Ronaldo’s presence is inescapable.

    At the modest airport, advertisements featuring Ronaldo greet passengers as they walk into the terminal. Ask a taxi driver for a “Ronaldo tour” and they will take you to the places of his youth. In Bairro Quinta Falcao, the area where Ronaldo grew up, the cafe his family would go to has pictures of him and one of his jerseys on the wall. “He still comes in when he is visiting,” the bartender said. “He likes a full plate of Portuguese fish.”

    Stop a person on the street in this neighborhood, and they will point to the space just behind Casa Azul, the blue building that serves as a community center. That empty lot is where Ronaldo’s childhood house used to stand. The house was torn down several years ago, though residents offer differing accounts why: Some say it was because vandals and vagrants made the house a target after Ronaldo moved his family into a nicer area; others say the Madeiran government, as well as Ronaldo, was concerned that the house projected a poor image of Ronaldo’s childhood.

    Photo

    A wax figure of Ronaldo is among the items at his museum. Ronaldo and Real Madrid will play in the Champions League final in Lisbon. CreditSamuel Aranda for The New York Times
    Ronaldo’s eldest sister, Elma, who operates a Ronaldo-branded clothing store in the more commercial part of Funchal, did not specify why the family’s house was demolished. “It was small,” she said. “But it was our home. And now things are different.”

    That was an understatement, too. Ronaldo lives in Madrid now with his girlfriend, a Russian model, and his 3-year-old son. His mother lives near him as well. His other sister, Katia, is a singer. His annual income, according to a recent estimate by Forbes, is $44 million.

    Not surprisingly, Ronaldo visits Funchal only “a few times a year,” Elma said, and, “whenever he comes he has to be in hiding.” There are always visitors, always people who want something. “It is hard for him,” she added.

    Recently, Ronaldo was here to celebrate the opening of his museum, a sharp gallery near the tourist areas that is dedicated to all things Ronaldo. All kinds of trophies — including random awards, such as one shaped like a ship that was bestowed upon Ronaldo for being the 2003-4 player of the year as voted on by the Scandinavian branch of the Manchester United Supporters Club — are on display, as are jerseys, photographs from Ronaldo’s childhood and a collection of match balls from each game during his career in which Ronaldo scored a hat trick.

    Ronaldo’s cousin, Nuno Viveiros, who lived with Ronaldo while he was playing for Manchester United, runs the museum. Two years older than Ronaldo, Viveiros was the captain of the youth team on which Ronaldo won his first tournament trophy (it is on display at the museum, too). Asked whether he found it at all presumptuous that Ronaldo would want to open a museum while still in the prime of his career, Viveiros waved his hand.

    “He had so many trophies already, it was good for him to display them,” Viveiros said. “Plus, he will win more and put them here, too.”

    That is a common sentiment among Madeirans, who have an unshakable belief in the magic of their favorite player. They remember the days before he was a brash wizard on the field, the days when he cried after losing games with Andorinha. They remember when his touch with the ball always seemed just a little bit smoother than the other boys.

    They remember, too, the time when he did not want to leave.
 

Trizy

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I think the great story of Ronaldo shouldn't be ''he came from nothing'', there has been players who were worse off and made it, Luiz Ronaldo for example couldn't pay for a bus to train with the Brazilian under age squad. No, the real story of Ronaldo should be his determination to be the best, sneaking into the gym to work out to become stronger and faster also the constant hunger of wanting to achieve more, win more and beat records he set himself.

Talent can only get you so far, just imagine Rooney or Zlatan being as dedicated as Roonie. Love or hate him, he is one of the best role models to ever play the game in that respect.
 

Kevin

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http://m.bbc.com/sport/football/27700801

no way was he 100 pct fit for the CL final. Justifies his immense celebration when he scored, he knows he is a hero who played under stress and pain for club and country and it all came together in Lisbon.

He could teach Rooney a thing or two.
 

amolbhatia50k

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Shame he's not going to be fit for the World Cup. There's Portugal's hopes gone.
 

Raul Madrid

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http://m.bbc.com/sport/football/27700801

no way was he 100 pct fit for the CL final. Justifies his immense celebration when he scored, he knows he is a hero who played under stress and pain for club and country and it all came together in Lisbon.

He could teach Rooney a thing or two.
I guess that injury is from playing every week without rest. He will probably play through it for as long as possible when the best thing to do will be to rest and let it heal. I would rather he missed the start of the season for Madrid than to play through the injury and make it worse then be out for several months.
 

kouroux

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I think the great story of Ronaldo shouldn't be ''he came from nothing'', there has been players who were worse off and made it, Luiz Ronaldo for example couldn't pay for a bus to train with the Brazilian under age squad. No, the real story of Ronaldo should be his determination to be the best, sneaking into the gym to work out to become stronger and faster also the constant hunger of wanting to achieve more, win more and beat records he set himself.

Talent can only get you so far, just imagine Rooney or Zlatan being as dedicated as Roonie. Love or hate him, he is one of the best role models to ever play the game in that respect.
I think Zlatan is a very bad example to the point you're trying to make.
 

Bob Loblaw

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It was obvious he wasn't fit. As I said at the time, he only has himself to blame - if he had rested when he should have instead of pushing himself to play in nothing games at the end of the season he'd probably be fully fit by now.
 

jojojo

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It was obvious he wasn't fit. As I said at the time, he only has himself to blame - if he had rested when he should have instead of pushing himself to play in nothing games at the end of the season he'd probably be fully fit by now.
Easily said, but I doubt Ronaldo saw them as nothing games, thought with hindsight they were. Madrid ended up 3 points behind Atletico - but they dropped 7 points in their last 4 games. Ronaldo got a 90th minute equaliser in one of those games and then played only 8 minutes in the next three. There probably were matches earlier in the season he could have sat out - the Schalke second leg for example, and Liga matches where he could have come off early, but I assume at that stage it didn't feel serious.

From there on, there wasn't really a run of fixtures where you could say the matches were meaningless. He did sit out the Copa final, Dortmund second leg and a couple of Liga matches. That gave him a 3 week break between the Dortmund first leg and the Bayern semi-final - but I can't really blame him for wanting to play in a CL semi. I think in the end he played 5 of their last 12 games, including the CL semis and Final.

The comparison that appeared in Marca a few days ago was with Rafa Nadal. He didn't need a three week break from playing/training to give his knee time to recover - he had to take a three month break and then take his time getting back into action.
 

Wednesday at Stoke

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Tendonitis of the knee is a serious issue and he consciously needs to reevaluate his usage to maintain his level of performances. Luckily for Madrid they have 2 other wingers who are world class and can afford to be selective with Ronaldo's appearances.
 

Bob Loblaw

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Easily said, but I doubt Ronaldo saw them as nothing games, thought with hindsight they were. Madrid ended up 3 points behind Atletico - but they dropped 7 points in their last 4 games. Ronaldo got a 90th minute equaliser in one of those games and then played only 8 minutes in the next three. There probably were matches earlier in the season he could have sat out - the Schalke second leg for example, and Liga matches where he could have come off early, but I assume at that stage it didn't feel serious.

From there on, there wasn't really a run of fixtures where you could say the matches were meaningless. He did sit out the Copa final, Dortmund second leg and a couple of Liga matches. That gave him a 3 week break between the Dortmund first leg and the Bayern semi-final - but I can't really blame him for wanting to play in a CL semi. I think in the end he played 5 of their last 12 games, including the CL semis and Final.

The comparison that appeared in Marca a few days ago was with Rafa Nadal. He didn't need a three week break from playing/training to give his knee time to recover - he had to take a three month break and then take his time getting back into action.
Nothing games is probably not a good description, you're right. I don't think it took hindsight to know he was playing with fire though, I said it back when he was risking his (at that stage) slight knock in games Real Madrid should have been able to get through without him.

The game against Valladolid for example, he was already carrying an injury at that stage and yet he still played (came off after about 10 minutes) - why? I know they didn't win the game but he was already pushing his luck before that game and should have rested it. Against Espanyol, again what was he doing even being included in the starting line-up while carrying an injury a week ahead of the Champions League final? He couldn't even make it through the warm-up in the end.

It's short-termism. The same has happened with Messi, against PSG they needed him on the pitch and they got through to the next round because he played but look at the long term effects that game (and others) have had on Messi's fitness. They need to manage themselves better and realise that it's better in the long run if they rest more, especially when they're carrying injuries. How many times did Ancelotti deny Cristiano had an injury over the past few months despite it being obvious he did have (at least) one?
 

antohan

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The game against Valladolid for example, he was already carrying an injury at that stage and yet he still played (came off after about 10 minutes) - why? I know they didn't win the game but he was already pushing his luck before that game and should have rested it. Against Espanyol, again what was he doing even being included in the starting line-up while carrying an injury a week ahead of the Champions League final? He couldn't even make it through the warm-up in the end.

It's short-termism. The same has happened with Messi, against PSG they needed him on the pitch and they got through to the next round because he played but look at the long term effects that game (and others) have had on Messi's fitness. They need to manage themselves better and realise that it's better in the long run if they rest more, especially when they're carrying injuries. How many times did Ancelotti deny Cristiano had an injury over the past few months despite it being obvious he did have (at least) one?
Three words: European Golden Boot
 

Redo91

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Tendonitis of the knee is a serious issue and he consciously needs to reevaluate his usage to maintain his level of performances. Luckily for Madrid they have 2 other wingers who are world class and can afford to be selective with Ronaldo's appearances.
Didn't Hargreaves have this in both his knees? Hopefully it doesn't turn into such a long term issue for Ronaldo.
 

Wednesday at Stoke

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Didn't Hargreaves have this in both his knees? Hopefully it doesn't turn into such a long term issue for Ronaldo.
Yeah Hargo had it but almost all the time he went down with a hammy before his knee could even bother him. Its a miracle he passes his yearly physicals let alone one to play professional football.
 

swooshboy

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Tendonitis of the knee is a serious issue and he consciously needs to reevaluate his usage to maintain his level of performances. Luckily for Madrid they have 2 other wingers who are world class and can afford to be selective with Ronaldo's appearances.
I think Hargreaves had tendinitis, not tendinosis - not sure how much that affects the recovery:

(From the article linked above):
"Tendinosis is caused by long-term wear and tear of the tendon. Low levels of damage build up if there is insufficient recovery time between matches.

"It is not the same as tendinitis, which is the result of overloading the tendon, resulting in inflammation.
 

NoLogo

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Just saw this gif on r/soccer and thought you lot might like it.



I really wish we still had an attacking player or two who could take on players one on one like Ronnie did but unfortunately those don't grow on trees.
 

Eric'sCollar

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Remember watching that, great viewing. Just that excitement he can bring is so special. We have missed it big time.
 

Malva

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that was ronnie at his best imo, that 06/07 demon who could dribble with the best, shoot, and had incredible agility and all around danger factor. A true winger phenom. Ronaldo these days is just a 9 who starts his run ups from the wings... much more statistically accountable, incredible end product ability.. but i sometimes wonder if he's really better for a team.
 

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Good times, Scholes pinging the ball to Ronaldo on one wing and Giggs on the other. I would go into 90% of the games fully expecting a 4-0 result.
 

CantonaGiggs1

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Just saw this gif on r/soccer and thought you lot might like it.



I really wish we still had an attacking player or two who could take on players one on one like Ronnie did but unfortunately those don't grow on trees.
The most exciting CR was the one who played for us.

He became a different player at Madrid. A statistical machine, but boring at times. He doesn't get involved in the build-up as much.
 

Isotope

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Why would someone defending with his back facing the opponent? Is it common?
 

stepic

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that was ronnie at his best imo, that 06/07 demon who could dribble with the best, shoot, and had incredible agility and all around danger factor. A true winger phenom. Ronaldo these days is just a 9 who starts his run ups from the wings... much more statistically accountable, incredible end product ability.. but i sometimes wonder if he's really better for a team.
Well his team did just win the CL...
 

Scarlett Dracarys

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NoLogo said:
Just saw this gif on r/soccer and thought you lot might like it.



I really wish we still had an attacking player or two who could take on players one on one like Ronnie did but unfortunately those don't grow on trees.
Those were the days
 

2 man midfield

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We had so much quality then. Ronaldo, Scholes,Hargreaves, Saha, Tevez, Rio, Evra and Vidic were in their prime...

Even the squad players were on another level: Park, Pique, Nani, Anderson, even Henrik Larsson for a bit!
 
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