‘He can’t play football’, Cassano attacks Ronaldo

Former Real Madrid forward, Antonio Cassano, has criticized Cristiano Ronaldo, suggesting the 39-year-old striker is overly selfish.

Ronaldo became the first player in the history of the sport to reach 900 goals earlier this month when he scored for Portugal against Croatia.

The Portuguese star has thus been hailed as one of the greatest goalscorer in football for his exploits in front of goal.

However, Cassano does not share the same view despite his landmark achievement. “Cristiano Ronaldo doesn’t know how to play football. He could score 3000 goals, I don’t give a f***”, he said, while speaking on the Viva El Futbol podcast.

“Higuain, Aguero, Benzema, Lewandowski, Ibrahimovic and Suarez knew how to link-up with the team. They knew how to do a lot of things, unlike Ronaldo whose only objective has always been to score”, the Italian added.

This is not the first time that Cassano has launched at the Portuguese. He has several times, shared his thoughts on the Al Nassr forward, criticising him on all occasions. Back in 2022, the former Italy and Parma striker told Ronaldo to hang up his boots.

“A guy like Cristiano has to think about himself and if you can’t do it anymore then you have to call it a day. It’s a rule in all sports. Retire, that’s enough! ‘He has won everything, he has been a phenomenon, he has earned a lot of money and now he is not a starter at Manchester United”, Cassano said.

The Italian is known for throwing criticism on players and coaches. He has also attacked likes of  Erling Haaland, Paulo Dybala, Mauro Icardi, Rafael Leao, Romelu Lukaku, Lautaro Martinez, and Jose Mourinho. His major praises has always been for Lionel Messi, Ronaldo Nazario and Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

Compared to Ronaldo who netted 450 goals for Madrid, Cassano failed to impress during his stint with the Los Blancos. He only managed four goals in 29 appearances across two years in Spain before being shipped back to his homeland.

Meanwhile, Cassano and Ronaldo have never crossed paths before, both as teammates and opponents, despite both playing for Madrid. The former Italy international joined in 2006, loaned to Sampdoria in 2007, before a permanent move a year later. However, Ronaldo arrived at the Spanish giants in 2009.

Cassano went on to retire in 2017 after 18 years in the sport. He scored only 139 goals for eight different clubs in Spain and Italy, winning four trophies.