Ronaldo

[Sir Tokyo Sexwale]

Not so long ago, just after winning the EC, they were thought of as invincible

 

 

Ronaldo is back! Or at least you'd think he was. A full midweek programme in La Liga, and never mind Osasuna climbing into second place, Santi Cañizares saving his fourth penalty in seven games, or even Nice Guy Greg Manzano working miracles in Mallorca, they're all banging on about the Brazilian. After all, Ronaldo, as the phrase goes, is mucho Ronaldo, a lot of Ronaldo. Well, quite. Fiddle the dial, hop the channels, peruse the papers, and there he is, buckteeth gleaming.

 

As Ronaldo left the field at the Romareda last night, steam coming off his head, he was pursued by a pack of hungry radio hams gripping microphones. He pushed his way past Radio Marca's intrepid pitch-side reporter, Miguelito Díaz, but couldn't escape the pack - which perhaps isn't surprising for a man who'd struggle to outrun a darts player carrying a round of drinks back from the bar. "I'm very pleased," he said, as fluffy mics tickled his nose. "But I play for myself, my family and my team - not to shut people's mouths. The hurricane can move on somewhere else now."

Indeed it can, and it will. For now, it's sunny down Ronaldo's way. Certainly in Madrid, anyway. "Goal from Ronie!" screamed the delighted cover of this morning's AS in great big yellow letters. Inside, mental Madridista Tomás Roncero was going loopy. "Goal! The end of 400 minutes of drought," Roncero wibble-wibbled, "and it was he who ended it of course: the Big Mac, the belly-boy, the one they said was finished, the dethroned prince. The great Ronaldo." Over in Marca, meanwhile, the headline ran: "Ronie rides again!"

 

"Yesterday Ronaldo was the resurrection," continued former Argentina goalkeeper Hugo Gatti. "The ship was sinking, but Ronaldo is the most important member of the crew and he rescued them all. What he did, only he can do."

 

Actually, that's not really true. Frankly, what Ronaldo did, this column could do as well if it wasn't too busy having a nice cup of tea.

 

Such is the fuss, you'd think Ronaldo had battered home a hat-trick, got himself a brace (although it's probably a bit late for that now), or at least scored a blinder. You would think that Real Madrid had chalked up a great victory and closed in on Barcelona, re-igniting their chances of winning the league. You'd think the galácticos had been half decent for once.

 

You wouldn't think that Ronaldo had scored his first goal in 36 days, Madrid's first in four matches. You wouldn't think that it was a rubbish goal, a total gift that arrived on 92 minutes after another awful display and served only to equalise against tenth-placed Real Zaragoza. And you certainly wouldn't think that Madrid had ended Week 29 worse off than when they started it.

 

But that's what happened. Trailing 1-0 to a neat goal from Diego Milito, David Beckham, who appears to be cultivating a kind of Teddy Boy quiff, clipped a left-footed cross into the box. Goalkeeper César dropped it straight to Ronaldo who scored from a few yards. A beauty it was not, but that didn't stop Iker Casillas getting exited. Until then had been wearing his Iker Casillas face - the one that says: "You call that a football team?!" - but suddenly he was leaping about, punching the air and screaming in delight. Which pretty much says it all about Madrid right now: they had just scored an equaliser in an essentially irrelevant game. Brilliant. Good work lads. Let's splash Ronaldo all over the papers.

 

Now, the last time Real Madrid played in Zaragoza they were hammered 6-1, so there has been some improvement, and finally getting a goal after three 0-0s is, of course, important - while finally getting one after 36 days is even more important for the man that one writer coolly described as a legend in his own lunch hour, and a last-minute goal always makes you feel like a winner. But that changes nothing.

 

It changes nothing because Real Madrid continue to be a disaster - even more of one than before, in fact, with Juan Ramón López Caro, utterly devoid of authority, flailing desperately in search of a solution. It was almost better when Florentino Perez picked the team. It changes nothing because the Brazil coach has admitted that Ronaldo is saving himself for the World Cup (which is weird for someone who won't even save himself for pudding). It changes nothing because Madrid are in chaos, with the board of directors split, manager after manager turning down the job and a new president who has lost the plot. It changes nothing because in the last two years, since Real Madrid let Samuel Eto'o go to Barcelona, he has scored twenty league goals more than Ronaldo.

 

Most of all, it changes nothing because Barcelona are simply a far better football team than Real Madrid, who aren't even a team. And because, with Barça beating Getafe 3-1 on Tuesday night, with Ronaldinho celebrating his birthday with a bunch of flowers, a huge cake and bundles of style and with Eto'o scoring twice (both of them better goals than Ronaldo's), Madrid's draw saw them slip to third, thirteen points behind their rivals. The polls are no longer asking whether Barça will win the league but when they'll win it, and the worst-case scenario anyone can come up with is Barça having to wait until three weeks from the end of the season, heaven forbid.

 

Which is why while the Madrid press lead on the image of Ronaldo, the Catalan dailies gleefully led on Iker Casillas wearing that Iker Casillas face instead, El Mundo Deportivo adding "13 down" and Sport singing "Adios, Madrid, Adiós". And that's just the league. Sport's Casablanca-inspired cartoon saying it all. "We'll always have Paris," announces Ronaldo, to which Raúl replies. "Er, no we won't - Arsenal knocked us out."

Edited March 23, 2006 by Macca