Independent: James Lawton on Ronaldo …
It was billed as a coronation for Manchester United and the most celebrated of their stars in the new Wembley fantasy park (sorry, that should be football stadium despite the dismaying quality of the pitch and most of the Cup final). Instead it was the big reality check for all those who forget some of the basic rules of measuring greatness.
Yes, we’re speaking - and without apology - of the latest farcical denouement of some of the more hysterical claims on behalf of Cristiano Ronaldo.
For many Ronaldo was the great magnet of a match invested with the challenge of properly launching another phase in the life of football’s ultimately vaunted piece of real estate. But then we have to forget the weight of history; Chelsea full-backs Paul Ferreira and Wayne Bridge - neither of whom has ever been mistaken for the new Maldini - didn’t need the help of such mystique to render Ronaldo so anonymous Sir Alex Ferguson, once again in a big match, must have been tempted to form a search party.
Great players - and Ronaldo has already been categorised as such even to the point of being compared to Pele and George Best - embrace such games as Saturday’s because they are the purpose of their lives.
Cutting it against some of the Premiership’s mediocrities is one thing; taking hold of the big stage, and the toughest opponents in the land, should be a progressively routine test of players who announce they are going to be remembered through the football ages.
Now those who so enthusiastically announced that Ronaldo had already arrived on such a plane surely have enough evidence to think again; to think, mostly that is, of the criteria of performance which separates in the all-time ratings those of the outstanding natural gifts with which Ronaldo undoubtedly has been bombarded and the others who also have the nerve and the vision to make them work under the greatest pressure.
It is in the second category that we find the Bests and the Peles. It is the first where Ronaldo remains anchored by his failure to confidently negotiate the end of a season in which he had received unprecedently lavish acclaim.
Where was Ronaldo when Didier Drogba, who was one minority choice for the honours which were heaped upon the Portuguese 22-year-old, scored his 33rd goal in all competition so magnificently in the last minutes of extra time? Where was he when Paul Scholes, the game’s best player by some distance, and the only one who seemed to know the value of turning on the ball in a truly positive frame of mind, was desperately trying to bring drive and order to his team?
He was where he was rooted throughout the entire match. In the margins. Tepid, without influence or a hint of spark, he was the same Ronaldo who was so becalmed in United’s catastrophic performance in the San Siro a few weeks ago.
Ronaldo’s crime was not in having a bad game. It can happen to any mortal and ever so occasionally even a great player. No, Ronaldo’s offence went rather deeper than some fleeting dip in form and commitment. It was the body language of discouragement that screamed out of him from the moment Chelsea’s defence made it clear there would no easy pickings, no suicidal lungings announcing susceptibility to his pace and balance, no hint of fear induced by the tide of wild and sometimes risible praise.
Comparisons? They came like a flock of starlings over the ragged turf. Johan Cruyff, who scored 33 goals for the Netherlands in 48 games, once masterminded a victory over England at the old Wembley with a series of sublime breaks and passes. Some observers swear he never crossed the half-way line.
George Best, whose finest moment at Wembley came with a European Cup-winning goal strike against Benfica, scored a goal against England at the old stadium that left Nobby Stiles - the man who tamed Eusebio - and Gordon Banks in his wake. Later Stiles reflected: “I shall never forget that goal because it said everything about George’s career and life. There he was, with the world falling on his head, drinking, losing touch with what had made his name so brilliantly, but still able to do something that made the little hairs on the back of your neck stand up. I said to him, ‘George, I’ll never forget that goal - only you could have scored it.’”
We are talking values here that go beyond a player’s age or style or character. We are discussing an endless urge to inflict yourself on great events. Sir Stanley Matthews was a teenager when he first lit up the Potteries - he was 38 when he fashioned the 1953 Cup final forever named in his honour. Pele was 17 when he scored a hat-trick in the World Cup final.
It is only when such standards are equalled that we can rush a 22-year-old through the gates of greatness.
No one would want, or, for the purposes of this argument, suggest that Ronaldo isn’t a player both of bewitching possibilities and also a striking reason for United’s first Premiership title in four years. No doubt they deserved their title; they played some excellent, expressive football and applied the pressure on Chelsea through the season. But then, just as in the case of their star player, they were maybe not as good as double triumph would have suggested.
United’s most consistent performer - when he was free of suspension - was unquestionably Paul Scholes, and the weight of his contribution - unrecognised at award ceremonies - had never been more explicit than on Saturday. He set a rhythm and a level of professionalism which was never matched by Michael Carrick or Darren Fletcher, and until it is United cannot assume any easy ability to march beyond the restrictions placed upon by them by Chelsea in the last of the domestic action.
United’s challenge is the same one that faces the sometimes luminous Cristiano Ronaldo. It is to improve at the critical point of delivering performance when it matters most. Without this, talk of greatness in a team or an individual will always be some kind of folly. Here, especially in the case of Ronaldo, it was as bad as it can be. All the evidence said, after all, that it was a ridiculous misapprehension.
