CR7’s farewell to the national team and the nightmare of the thousand goals. What a bore, lads

Obrigado, and cheers. It is a shame that Cristiano Ronaldo does not drink, but his farewell to the national team deserves, if not a proper celebration, then at least a toast. I will not resort to the facile gag of saying that the national team had already said goodbye to Cristiano Ronaldo, and after the embarrassing display in the last round of the Nations League caused by Jorge Jesus, his return to the pitch in the Portugal shirt would have felt like a farce. Still, these farewells to the national team—delivered with all the rhetorical weight of farewells to the game itself—feel more cloying than a non-alcoholic beer. The Argentine “circus act” had already done so a few weeks ago, bid farewell by everyone as if he had died; the man who, according to the media, has been most obsessed with him simply had to follow suit.

He did so whilst reading a rather trite letter on a sheet of paper in a video posted on social media, accompanied by sentimental background music, images of his career with the national team, of him as a child, him celebrating, him lifting a trophy, him crying, the fans cheering him on, and a few motivational quotes about the importance of dreaming, the honour of defending Portugal’s colours, the duty to fight to win and be the best, and the importance of the team (those arseholes). Anyone who has been reading this column for some time knows that we have a soft spot for the bald Portuguese player far more than for the over-protected Messi, if only because, of the two, the only one who has actually played and won in England is the former. However, since comparisons between the two have become a source of considerable frustration—even more so than the analysis of the mid-term election in Michigan—I shall refrain from making any further ones.

The Portuguese player shows no sign of stopping – assuming that playing in Saudi Arabia counts as a professional career – and the Portuguese Football Federation has promised to organise a memorable farewell match (could anything be sadder? I don’t think so, apart from perhaps a Lecce v Venezia match played on a Monday evening) and he – having said that he doesn’t care much for records as they are there to be broken – will continue to aim for the record of 1,000 career goals whilst playing in a league that moves at the same pace as a Thursday-evening five-a-side match amongst fifty-somethings. Cristiano Ronaldo was a great player; he became a legend here with us in Manchester, and he has, objectively speaking, made this sport more beautiful for at least twenty years.

He should have retired years ago – there was no FIFA willing to sell out just to help him win a World Cup – but he is only now beginning to do so, bit by bit, subjecting readers to a steady stream of hundreds of articles on our very own CR7, statistics on how Portugal won nothing before him, and the wagging fingers of those who’ll explain to us that he was wrong to think he was untouchable, and so on. Like all the greats of this era, he is terrified of retiring and seeing himself grow old – but in life everything comes to an end, except the blonde in my pint as long as the pub stays open – but above all, he harbours an unspoken fear of being caught by Messi at the 1,000-goal mark once he’s hung up his boots. It is this, more than anything else, that unsettles and torments him.