Explain to us oh so mister knowledge how he is defending from the front when not pressing? He sure as hell doesn't have a tackle on him.
Also, you're saying he can do nothing a striker can but defend from the front. Wonder why we sold lingard then pretty sure we could play him there instead
A striker that can't attack effectively is useless. The defending is pointless. Defenders are at ease and able to compose themselves.
With Ronaldo defenders were instantly on the edge and wary of threat. You stretch their defense and give our final third attackers a chance to work their magic. It's why things changed when Ronaldo came on. It's why ant club Ronaldo has been in he lifts the whole team
He doesn't press as much
as we'd like but he does so more than Ronaldo, and does go into tackles more than Ronaldo (again not as much as we'd like but it's not that hard to surpass Ronaldo who is behind the pack in these aspects), that is defending from the front - it prevents opponents building from the back to mount sustained attacks and his speed keeps them honest and prevents them pouring people forward. Does that help?
As an attacker, he also makes runs which creates space for his teammates, can go past a player, and is a very viable counter attack outlet. I say this while recognising that Rashford is a poor option as a CF.
Ronaldo came on when the game had opened up and the opponents desperate for an equaliser and did slightly better than he did in the previous games by finding some spaces and actually managing to complete some simple passes this time while missing two chances to score or create a scoring situation. Other than that, Leicester has zero pressure from him building out from the back. Rashford is not the answer, but it's utterly idiotic and ignorant not to acknowledge that even strikers play a part in a team's defensive effectiveness.
About Ronaldo lifting any team he joins ...
are you being serious? Last time that happened was when he joined Real Madrid, the effect on whole teams since then has actually been the opposite.
Ronaldo will get goals, but the defensive solidarity of the team will suffer