There have been plenty of experts consulted lately about Cristiano Ronaldo’s value and his remaining match-winning capabilities in this, his 21st year as a senior player. A handful, voters for the Ballon d’Or, recognised that he still had enough to rank as the world’s 20th best footballer during 2021/22.
A day before Monday’s ceremony for the award, pundits had been opining on Ronaldo’s ostentatious grumbles at being substituted in the second half of Manchester United’s goalless draw with Newcastle United.
One expert declining to offer a critical view on Ronaldo’s importance for his club is Antonio Conte, who takes Tottenham Hotspur to Old Trafford Wednesday evening.
“I am the last person who should answer this question,” joked the Spurs manager on being asked about Ronaldo’s current status. “Last season he scored a hat-trick against us! We lost 3-2 to him, not to Manchester United. So, fingers crossed this time.”
Ronaldo’s three goals against Tottenham back in mid-March can look, in the sweep of events since, like the last bulkhead against a tide of personal decline.
The last meeting of the clubs briefly cast the Portuguese as the saviour United believed they had retrieved when he returned to club for a second spell. He gave them the lead with a superb drive from outside the Tottenham penalty area. He restored the lead with a right-place-right-time tap-in. He guaranteed the three points after a second Spurs equaliser with a thumping header.
Two matches later, Ronaldo scored another match-winning hat-trick, against Norwich City, part of a sequence of nine league goals in six games. He was named the Premier League’s Player of the Month.
A top-four finish was then still a United target until their season’s stop-start momentum wheezed again. Part of the reason Conte can look back with a light-hearted laugh on the day Ronaldo performed his one-man destruction is that Tottenham later overtook United in the race for Champions League qualification.
After Ronaldo struck his hat-trick, Spurs had been left trailing fifth-placed United by five points and by three rungs in the table.
That seems a while ago, given that Conte’s Tottenham are now compiling a best-ever start to a Premier League season. For all the positive signals that Erik ten Hag, the new manager, has generated over a run of five United wins in seven league outings, his team look light on goalscoring punch ahead of an intense few days.
After he cut short, on 72 minutes, Ronaldo’s second start of the league campaign against Newcastle, the United manager explained the decision as part of a strategy to keep his attacking players fresh, with Spurs at home then a trip to Chelsea on Saturday.
Ten Hag will have uses for Ronaldo, who made plain his desire to leave Manchester during the summer and has one league goal in 2022/23, across those games, and he knows the player well enough not to be too concerned by the head-shaking and muttering that followed his substitution against Newcastle.
He imagined Ronaldo would watch his replacement Marcus Rashford head wide and Fred miss tucking home a cross, believing that if he, CR7, had been on the end of either opportunity, he would have scored both times.
Man United 0 Newcastle 0 - player ratings
Rashford had been suffering from illness ahead of the Newcastle game, while Antony Martial is recovering from a back problem. That helped push Ronaldo’s case to, unusually under Ten Hag, start a second game on the trot. A third start within a six-day period for the veteran would buck the season’s trend.
Conte says he’d rather see less of Ronaldo, 37, on this trip to Old Trafford, or at least a “more calm” version than in March. “He continues to make a difference,” said the Italian, paying tribute to Ronaldo for having “made the story of football in the last 15 years”.
And part of that story is a striking overall record against Spurs. They are one of his favourite punchbags. Against no English club has Ronaldo registered more of his 700 career goals. He has 14 against Tottenham in 20 matches, in only one of which – a 2017 Champions League group game for Real Madrid – did he finish on the losing side.
He’s the one member of the current United squad old enough to recall, from his previous spell, the era when the then United manager, Alex Ferguson, would prepare for playing Tottenham by dismissing them as fragile lightweights, with a now famous phrase: ‘Lads, it’s Spurs”.
Conte is entitled to smile about that. The Italian has not perfected Tottenham, but he has toughened them up.
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UK-EU trade at a glance
EU fishing vessels guaranteed access to UK waters for 12 years
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Youth experience scheme to work, study or volunteer in UK and EU countries
Smoother border management with use of e-gates
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
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Pot 1: Iran, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, China
Pot 2: Iraq, Uzbekistan, Syria, Oman, Lebanon, Kyrgyz Republic, Vietnam, Jordan
Pot 3: Palestine, India, Bahrain, Thailand, Tajikistan, North Korea, Chinese Taipei, Philippines
Pot 4: Turkmenistan, Myanmar, Hong Kong, Yemen, Afghanistan, Maldives, Kuwait, Malaysia
Pot 5: Indonesia, Singapore, Nepal, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Mongolia, Guam, Macau/Sri Lanka
Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
Background: Chemical Weapons
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
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- Price: Not announced yet
Our legal advisor
Ahmad El Sayed is Senior Associate at Charles Russell Speechlys, a law firm headquartered in London with offices in the UK, Europe, the Middle East and Hong Kong.
Experience: Commercial litigator who has assisted clients with overseas judgments before UAE courts. His specialties are cases related to banking, real estate, shareholder disputes, company liquidations and criminal matters as well as employment related litigation.
Education: Sagesse University, Beirut, Lebanon, in 2005.
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FIGHT%20CARD
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U19 WORLD CUP, WEST INDIES
UAE group fixtures (all in St Kitts)
- Saturday 15 January: UAE beat Canada by 49 runs
- Thursday 20 January: v England
- Saturday 22 January: v Bangladesh
UAE squad:
Alishan Sharafu (captain), Shival Bawa, Jash Giyanani, Sailles
Jaishankar, Nilansh Keswani, Aayan Khan, Punya Mehra, Ali Naseer, Ronak Panoly,
Dhruv Parashar, Vinayak Raghavan, Soorya Sathish, Aryansh Sharma, Adithya
Shetty, Kai Smith
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3. Large black holes can also be formed when smaller ones collide and merge
4. The biggest black holes lurk at the centre of many galaxies, including our own
5. Astronomers believe that when the universe was very young, black holes affected how galaxies formed
Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
F1 2020 calendar
March 15 - Australia, Melbourne; March 22 - Bahrain, Sakhir; April 5 - Vietnam, Hanoi; April 19 - China, Shanghai; May 3 - Netherlands, Zandvoort; May 20 - Spain, Barcelona; May 24 - Monaco, Monaco; June 7 - Azerbaijan, Baku; June 14 - Canada, Montreal; June 28 - France, Le Castellet; July 5 - Austria, Spielberg; July 19 - Great Britain, Silverstone; August 2 - Hungary, Budapest; August 30 - Belgium, Spa; September 6 - Italy, Monza; September 20 - Singapore, Singapore; September 27 - Russia, Sochi; October 11 - Japan, Suzuka; October 25 - United States, Austin; November 1 - Mexico City, Mexico City; November 15 - Brazil, Sao Paulo; November 29 - Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi.
Tearful appearance
Chancellor Rachel Reeves set markets on edge as she appeared visibly distraught in parliament on Wednesday.
Legislative setbacks for the government have blown a new hole in the budgetary calculations at a time when the deficit is stubbornly large and the economy is struggling to grow.
She appeared with Keir Starmer on Thursday and the pair embraced, but he had failed to give her his backing as she cried a day earlier.
A spokesman said her upset demeanour was due to a personal matter.
Global state-owned investor ranking by size
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China
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UAE
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Japan
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Norway
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Canada
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