Cristiano Ronaldo hammered 5-0 in pre-season friendly but he still fires dig at Messi joining MLS over Saudi league
CRISTIANO RONALDO’S Al-Nassr suffered a 5-0 thrashing to Celta Vigo during a pre-season friendly in Portugal.
Ronaldo joined the Saudi Arabian giants in December after Manchester United terminated his contract following a tell-all interview in which he slammed the club from top to bottom.
CR7 has since been struggling to create the same magic he produced at United, Real Madrid, Juventus and Portugal with Luis Castro’s side missing out on the title to Al-Ittihad last season.
The five-time Ballon d’Or winner’s woes continued on Monday with a heavy defeat to Rafa Benitez’s Celta at the Estadio Algarve.
The star forward started in the first half alongside Al-Nassr‘s summer signing Marcelo Brozovic and went back to the dressing room with the score 0-0.
The Portugal captain and Brozovic were taken off in the early stages of the second half and that is when the LaLiga side started firing with Gael Alonso opening the scoring on 57 minutes.
Miguel Rodriguez and Jorgen Strand Larsen registered braces to cap off a dominant win.
But despite the humbling defeat to Celta, who finished 13th last season, Ronaldo appeared to take a swipe at legendary rival Lionel Messi after he was unveiled by David Beckham’s Inter Miami.
The 38-year-old insists the Saudi Pro League is “better” than the MLS and predicted the Middle Eastern competition will overtake the Turkish as well as Dutch top flight in just one year.
This comes after several stars moved to Saudi Arabia, such as Ruben Neves, N’Golo Kante and Karim Benzema, and now the United great insists he will never return to Europe.
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Ronaldo said: “The Saudi league is better than the MLS.
“I’m 100 per cent sure I won’t return to any European club. I opened the way to the Saudi league and now all the players are coming here. I won’t return to European football, the door is completely closed.
“I’m 38-years-old, also European football has lost lot of quality. The only league that for me has a lot of quality and is at a higher level than all the others is the Premier League.
“The Spanish league does not have that great quality. The Portuguese league is a good league, but it is not a top, top league.
“The German league I think has also lost a lot. I’m sure I won’t play in Europe again. I want to play in Saudi Arabia.
“In one year, more and more top players will come to Saudi. In a year the Saudi league will overtake the Turkish league and Dutch league.”