good a few weeks after Lionel Messi, it was Cristiano Ronaldo ’ s turn to switch clubs. The two biggest stars in ball-shaped football are joining new teams in the lapp transplant windowpane after Manchester United confirmed that it had acquired Ronaldo from italian giant Juventus .
The cabaret announced the move barely hours after Juventus head coach Massimiliano Allegri revealed that Ronaldo told him he would not be playing for Juventus again. The actor cleaned out his locker and said farewell to his teammates on Friday, before reportedly hopping on a plane to Portugal.

And just like that, with a year remaining on his contract at Juventus, the 36-year-old Ronaldo will be returning to the cabaret where he became a worldly concern star during six seasons from 2003 through 2009. It ‘s a stun turn of events given that earlier in the same day it was believed that Manchester City was silent in pole position to sign the Portuguese star topology, only for the Red Devils to beat them to it. And merely a workweek before, it sounded like he would be seeing out his contract at Juventus .

Why did Ronaldo leave Juventus?

Juventus is once again the favored to win the italian league title in the season that precisely started and the club is besides expected to make a trench run in the UEFA Champions League contest. So why would Ronaldo leave one of the most storied clubs in Europe ?
Getty Images hypertext transfer protocol : //images.daznservices.com/di/library/sporting_news/c3/6e/cristiano-ronaldo-juventus-celebration-2020-2021_vyefs095n0mb1j6ywo2sv12qm.jpg ? t=-2008404101 & w=500 & quality=80 Although Ronaldo has delivered in a big way since arriving at Juventus — both on and off the field — his deviation works out for both the actor and cabaret. Why a move made sense for Ronaldo: Although Juventus has elite talent, it ’ second clear that the baseball club is not on the lapp level as Chelsea, Manchester City, Paris Saint-Germain and Bayern Munich in the race to win the UEFA Champions League. Ronaldo is a five-time Champions League winner and with two more titles he would set the all-time record for european clubhouse championships for a musician. At 134 goals and count, he already has the most goals of any musician in the history of the competition. Ronaldo cares about his stigmatize and bequest and he wants to go down as the greatest of all clock. If he can spend the next two or three seasons with a team that can help him win the bad trophy and outshine Messi and PSG, he could so far shape the narrative about how he will be remembered. It wasn ’ thyroxine going to happen at Juventus. MORE: UEFA Champions League group draw results The Juventus perspective: Ronaldo is a goal-scoring car and he was the lead scorer in Serie A last season ( 29 goals ). His 101 goals in 134 games for Juve — the fastest player to 100 goals in club history — helped Juventus win all three domestic titles during his time at the clubhouse. But the Turin-based side didn ’ t spend $ 120 million to acquire Ronaldo in 2018 to win in Italy. The Bianconeri were hoping Ronaldo would get them over the bulge and help them win their first UEFA Champions League entitle since 1996. It hasn ’ thyroxine happened — three different coaches in three seasons did not help — and Juventus suffered shock absorber smasher round exits in each of his three seasons, never reaching the semifinals. Reports suggested that Ronaldo took the Round of 16 elimination to Porto in March particularly hard, and less than six months subsequently he ’ south on his means out. Getty Images hypertext transfer protocol : //images.daznservices.com/di/library/sporting_news/1d/77/cristiano-ronaldo-juventus-champions-league-2021_u9osjnnc84cj1p6elfdyxb2xg.jpg ? t=-2008329341 & w=500 & quality=80

There are besides off-field considerations. Given the gross challenges brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, an estimate $ 235 million budget deficit this season, and Ronaldo ’ s $ 100 million-a-year price to the club between his wage and the amortization of his transfer fee, moving on besides makes feel from a fiscal point of view. The Ronaldo skill in 2018 no doubt helped elevate the Juventus sword : The cabaret has a higher external profile, double the sociable followers, and it leveraged Ronaldo for meaning increases in revenues and partnerships. But the pandemic changed the fiscal expectation for the club, and on the plain Juventus is resetting and going younger. The time for a Ronaldo transfer worked across the board. here was Ronaldo ‘s Instagram farewell message to fans :

Ronaldo rejoins Manchester United

There were early indications that a summer move was a real hypothesis since before Euro 2021. That ‘s when reports began to surface about Juventus needing to transfer Ronaldo to balance the budgets, there were images of moving trucks transporting his cars away from his home in Turin, and there was besides the Instagram post that truly felt like a adieu to Italy and Juve fans. As the summer weeks went by, newly rumors surfaced of potential interest from Real Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain, depending on how the dominoes fell with the potential transfer of young french headliner Kylian Mbappe. Ronaldo ’ randomness indignant Instagram post in reaction to all that transfer chatter conspicuously left out note of his committedness to spending his final examination season with Juventus. But on the day of the clubhouse ’ randomness first italian Serie A meet of the new season, Juventus administration and its head coach indicated that Ronaldo was n’t going anywhere, apparently putting an end to the drama. Juve head coach Allegri said Ronaldo told him at that time that he was staying. But then “ the transfer commercialize happened, ” as Allegri put it. “ The situation changed and we need to accept it. ” Most believed that change was Manchester City missing out on No. 1 forward target Harry Kane, who opted to stay at Tottenham Hotspur this summer. Man City was linked with Ronaldo in an apparent undertake to fill the center forward character that Kane would have occupied. The reigning english champions managed by Pep Guardiola have frequently operated without a true central striker, with a host of attackers filling the character last season and midfielders besides picking up the goal-scoring slump. Ronaldo would have proven an interest burst with the number of scoring chances that Manchester City generates. And Man City, a Champions League finalist in 2021, is hungry to win its first european title. So the ambitions would have lined up. But it ‘s not a move that would have sat well with Manchester United supporters and the club came out of the nowhere to strike a bargain to bring him back to Old Trafford. Ronaldo became a ball-shaped ace and Manchester United icon during his six seasons at the clubhouse. Former teammate and current Man United promontory coach Ole Gunnar Solskjaer talked about his clubhouse ‘s interest curtly before the official confirmation. “ He is a caption of this club, the greatest player of all clock time if you ask me, ” Solskjaer told media Aug. 27 in the wake of the news that Ronaldo was leaving Juventus. “ He knows what we feel about him. If he was always going to move away from Juventus, he knows we ‘re here. ” Getty Images hypertext transfer protocol : //images.daznservices.com/di/library/sporting_news/81/ce/cristiano-ronaldo-manchester-united-2004_f1q5h5oqhfnb11r44pbhfx4b2.jpg ? t=-2008282133 & w=500 & quality=80

The Red Devils were there : with a $ 33 million transfer tip to add Ronaldo to a team with a leading attack that features Paul Pogba, Bruno Fernandes, Marcus Rashford, Edinson Cavani and up-and-comer Mason Greenwood. The $ 33 million transfer fee will satisfy Juventus, who were reportedly hoping for $ 35 million in order not to lose money on the Ronaldo process. For a soon-to-be 37-year-old Ronaldo, who was in the final examination year of his narrow, it ‘s not a bad conduct for the Italians. And Juventus besides gets his brawny contract off the club ‘s books. It ‘s a act that could be the storybook ending for Ronaldo ‘s european career. Manchester United will besides feature in the 2021-2022 UEFA Champions League, competing in a group that includes Villarreal, Atalanta and BSC Young Boys. With Ronaldo, the Red Devils are immediately a serious rival to win their first Champions League trophy since 2008, when Ronaldo however starred for them. Their last Champions League final came in May 2009, Ronaldo ‘s last season with Manchester United before a transfer to Real Madrid. It remains to be seen whether Ronaldo will be in the Manchester United team a soon as the Aug. 29 trip to Wolves for Matchday 3 of the English Premier League season. It would seem more probably for Ronaldo to wait until after the September international demote to make his debut against Newcastle on September 11 at Old Trafford .