2008 wasn't a season.
It was a love letter written with a football.
A boy from Madeira, 23 years old, with a fade cut and knees full of fire, decided the world was too small and he would outgrow it.
Old Trafford was his garden.
He didn't play on the wing, he lived there. Cutting in, knuckles white, the ball glued to his feet like it was scared to leave him.
February. Free kick against Portsmouth. The knuckleball. The air stood still. The net shivered. The cameras couldn't track it, only the goal could.
42 times he made England stand up. 42 times.
Not as a striker waiting in the box. As a winger. Tracking back, sprinting forward, heading like a centre forward, scoring like a dream.
He carried United to Moscow. Rain in Moscow. Slippery grass, heavy shirt. He rose. He always rose. Header. 1-0. He had done his part.
He missed the penalty in the shootout and cried before we could win. Because he cared that much. He hid his face. And when Van der Sar saved, he stood up again. Like he always does.
Premier League. Champions League. Golden Boot here. Golden Boot there. Golden Shoe for all of Europe.
And in December, a little golden ball in his hands in Paris. He held it like a boy holding his mother's promise that he would become the best in the world.
2008 was not statistics.
It was the year a boy told us: I will work until talent is jealous of me.
@jonathan_eketex@UgwunnaEjikem Exactly! When you watch Ronaldo, you keep asking how? How do you even do that? Why will you even attempt that! And he just casually does it!
Les Nigérians qui prient pour que ce soit leur président wesh y a pas à être égoïste comme ça , Vous l’avez depuis 3 ans seulement nous on supporte le nôtre depuis 44 ans Vous pouvez nous accorder ce décès, non ? 😭
@tutututuulip And of course, all you have to do to deserve such a man is to just *exist* because posessing female parts apparently makes you special.
Bunch of awful, mediocre, self-immersed, boring people who have never been told that you actually need to work to get whatever it is you want.
When it was CR7, you all said he should leave the club and that he was sabotaging the team.
He told you the facilities were stuck in 2009. He told you the structure was broken. He told you the owners didn't care. He told you Carrington was outdated. He told you the mentality was gone. And what did you do? You called him toxic. You called him selfish. You said he was disrespecting the badge, that he was holding the club hostage, that he should just leave.
Now Lisandro Martinez says the same thing and he is a hero.
He said the club is far behind. He said the standards are low. He said we are years away from being a top club. And now you are clapping. You are posting his quotes. You are calling him a leader with passion.
Nothing changed.
Everything Ronaldo said was true then and it is still true now. Years later we are still years behind what a top team should look like. Same broken structure, same low standards, same Glazer mess.
You didn't hate what he said. You just hated who said it.
We cannot afford another expensive abandoned project. Nigeria's urgent development needs are more real and essential. We do not need landscape decoration escapades. -PO