Cristiano Ronaldo played for six years with Manchester United, and after the English club's Champions League triumph in 2008, the Portuguese superstar knew it was time to move on. And so a year after, the striker made the jump to Real Madrid, which according to Gary Neville was inevitable.
Neville said he saw it coming when CR7 dropped hints following the win over Chelsea that his time at Old Trafford was coming to an end. In the season that followed, Ronaldo's campaign with the Red Devils saw the club winning its third Premier League title with the Portuguese then his momentous transfer to La Liga.
"You were almost ready-prepared for it, you knew he was leaving the year after. It was coming, it was obvious that one day he would want to go and experience Madrid and La Liga," Metro reported the United legend as saying.
Neville, who played with Ronaldo, added that United losing its marquee player happened a year before the actual departure.
"I think because he did the interview after the 2008 final where he sort of alluded to the fact that he was going, it was almost like you had an advanced warning," he explained.
Neville recalled too that the weather in England bothered Ronaldo. The latter was clearly more comfortable with the sun always out in Spain so moving out became an easier decision. In the end, the star was looking for new challenges in a more suitable environment so he made the switch.
"I think he also wanted to obviously live in Spain and do La Liga. But the weather was a big problem for him and I felt like he'd almost traveled his path, he'd done the journey," said the United hero.
The possibility of convincing his former teammate might have crossed his mind but Neville said that he saw the conviction on Ronaldo's part to make the move. There was no stopping the club's superstar from going elsewhere.
"And I didn't feel that anything I was going to say was going to bring him out of that," Mirror reported the former United defender as saying.
He offered that Ronaldo's exit from Old Trafford was different as in most cases players that were tipped to leave during their time would have elected to stay if the club boss will give them a hint that they were still wanted.
In Ronaldo's case, he decided to leave because his time with the club was over, Neville said, adding the striker could be classified as the type of players "that were leaving mainly were because they had come to the end of the road for one reason or another."
In the past days, reports said Ronaldo could be leaving Juventus soon and unsurprisingly, United has emerged as one of his likely destinations in case of an abrupt exit from Turin.
