What if we had kept Ronaldo...

[AkaAkuma]

I believe it's possible to ride out the unhappiness, benefit from their continued performance and try to renew at the later date.

I believe the de Gea saga and Spur's approach to contracts has shown it's possible and ultimately more beneficial than trying to replace a star player with the incoming transfer fee that will quickly pail in comparision to transfer inflation.

Which is a roundabout way of saying, keep Pogba. He's reached his peak years, he has maybe 3 more years at the top before he declines, hold him to his contract and try and renew later. If he leaves on a free, we bank his best years.

We will be lucky to get 100m for him, which wouldnt leave much change from a Maddison.

 

[Gehrman]

We would walk the league every year and probably have won a CL or two more.

 

[2 man midfield]

Ronaldo is 10 times the player Pogba is.

 

[sun_tzu]

Ronaldo would have sulked a lot ... We had a really good team at the time and I think that would have been disruptive

As for pogba I think unless the Saudis come in and offer him crazy money the reality is that come the summer he will still be one of the best midfielders in the world... Probably coming off the back of a good tournament with France and not totally enthused with the thought of Thursday night football
I'd cash in whilst we can if we get a good offer from real / psg / juve (anybody really but I think they must be the likley interested clubs with enough cash)

 

[BlueMoonOutcast]

Ronaldo is 10 times the player Pogba is.

You've missed several zeros.

 

[Gio]

The utopia of a happy Ronaldo hitting his peak and staying at Old Trafford was highly unlikely. You might have ended up with more seasons of his slightly sulky and relatively below par 08/09 performance level rather than the heights he went on to reach in Madrid or even the standard he was operating at during 06-08. And in terms of personality he’s probably the last person you’d want to have kept anywhere under duress.

 

[Nevilles.Wear.Prada]

4 EPL and 2 CL at MINIMUM. What a player.

 

[Litch]

He would never have achieved what he went on to do in football.

 

[paulscholes18]

Might still have moyes as manager

 

[GenZRed]

I've come to the conclusion that he doesn't love Manchester United. He waxed lyrical when he left us that 'Manchester United will always be in my heart.' Then he turned around and said the same things about Real Madrid when he left them. That is despite how much love our fans had for him compared to Real Madrid's fans. Some Man United fans were singing 'Viva Ronaldo' during that game at OT, when he came onto the pitch to warm against Madrid in the knockout stages of the CL in the 2012-13 season.

He loves Ferguson, no doubt about it. He doesn't love Manchester United Football Club.

 

[cafecillos]

It's probably better not to think about it much, if you're a United supporter, but, for the sake of argument, I think it's safe to say that the last 10 years would have been very, very different for United (and probably also for Real Madrid). It's hard to imagine a scenario in which you wouldn't have won several leagues and maybe even more than one CL. But focusing on Pogba, which is what the OP apparently intended, I'd say I agree, I'd keep him too, for two main reasons: one is that I don't think United's management would make the best possible use of the potential transfer fee; the second is the quality of Pogba itself.

In my view (I'm a Barcelona supporter, but I'm also sympathetic to United, that's why I'm here), I'm relatively optimistic considering the version of Pogba we saw when OGS first arrived. He did something that neither Deschamps, nor Allegri, nor Mourinho himself managed to: set up a suitable environment for Pogba. I've always regarded Pogba as a player who should be among the very best players in the world (an absolute beast, both physically and technically), but somehow I'm never fully convinced he actually is. So far, he's mostly been a player of moments and specific circumstances, and not so much a player on whom you can successfully build a winning team. At Juventus he showed some of his potential but I don't think he ever was the undisputed star and/or leader of the team, it was not really "his" team, in the same way as France has been more Mbappé and even Griezmann's team than Pogba's. In both cases, I'd say he obviously added tons of quality but he's never taken up the reins as I believe he could.

With the United we enjoyed right after OGS came in as caretaker it was different, I think, he came up with a setting, an ecosystem (if I can use this word in this context) where he felt comfortable and made the most of his strengths, and he really thrived. OGS's tactical approach revolved around Paul Pogba, from playing the ball out of the back to the opponent's box (becoming at times the most advanced player on the pitch), and even his involvement in the press system was remarkable. I'm hopeful we can still see his best version when he returns from injury, which would improve your team massively.