TBT: When Cristiano Ronaldo was close to playing for Liverpool

To date, one of the greatest ever to play football, Cristiano Ronaldo is a Manchester United legend. His first senior team was Sporting Lisbon, but the five-time Ballon d’Or winner rose to fame once he started playing under the great Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United.

Cristiano Ronaldo first played for Manchester United in 2003

But, have you ever imagined how it would be if Cristiano Ronaldo started his England journey with arch-rivals Liverpool instead of United? Well, the move was almost a possibility! Back in 2003, the Portuguese legend was very close to signing for the Reds. Phil Thompson, the then Liverpool assistant coach revealed in The Athletic in 2022 that a deal was finalized for Ronaldo to play for Liverpool.

He further shared the details of the deal saying, “It’s £ 4 million and it can be paid over the four years of his contract, so £ 1 million a year. That seemed very reasonable. Then I asked about the salary and Tony told me it was £1million a year, net.”

Thompson further added that everything was finalized but later on a Tuesday while having lunch at the training grounds, they saw the news on TV, and they were left shocked and almost choked on their food!

It was almost rumored that Manchester United were not initially in plans to sign Cristiano Ronaldo, but only after seeing his heroics in a friendly game against them, the Red Devils decided to secure him.

However, in Rio Ferdinand’s talk show, the then CEO Peter Kenyon claimed that this rumor was false. He revealed that Manchester United failed to sign Ronaldinho, who joined FC Barcelona later, so they decided to secure Ronaldo even before the friendly game.

He added (Quoting the Mirror), “We didn’t get Ronaldinho and then I remember the manager [Alex Ferguson] being devastated on the training ground. Then I didn’t hear any murmurings about anyone else…..“We go and play Sporting and we leave the stadium knowing we’ve signed him [Ronaldo]. But I thought that was just reactive to that performance.”