Cristiano Ronaldo has probably been having the best year in his entire career in 2016 at least in terms of silverware and the 31-year-old Portuguese superstar had been approached by an unnamed Chinese club with a world-record breaking offer. Ronaldo’s agent Jorge Mendes has confirmed that the Real Madrid forward has rejected an offer from an unnamed club in China worth more than €300m (£257m, $316m) with a yearly salary of over €100m (£85m, $89.5m). Should the former Manchester United winger have accepted the offer, he would have surpassed Paul Pogba’s record move to Old Trafford from Juventus and become the world’s most expensive player for the second time in his career.
The Portuguese Forward has had the most trophy-laden year of his career winning all the major trophies except for the Spanish La Liga. He was instrumental for Real as they handed Atletico Madrid their second defeat in two finals in the Champions League, clinching an 11th European title for the club. And even though he could not take part in the Euro 2016 final against France, his performance in the tournament was pivotal in getting Portugal into the final. The year couldn’t have been better for the Portuguese after he capped it off with winning the Ballon D.Or in December and hence, the interests in him from other clubs have skyrocketed substantially.
The Chinese Super League has signed the likes of Oscar and Carlos Tevez for record fees and are willing to splurge further money to bring the best players in the world to Asia by bringing in more big names with insane contract agreements. Jorge Mendes, who has been Ronaldo’s agent since the onset of his career, reportedly chose to spoke in -length about the current transfer market and why this certain transfer request put in for the Portuguese had no other possible action but rejection.
“From China, they’ve offered 300m Euros to Real Madrid and more than 100m per year to the player. But money is not everything. Real Madrid is his life. Cristiano is happy at Real Madrid and it is impossible to go to China. The Chinese market is a new market. They can buy a lot of players, but then again it is impossible to go for Ronaldo. Cristiano is the best player in the world and best ever. It is normal to have some offers. He won the European Championship with Portugal, it’s like winning the Italian league with Genoa: they were not the favourite.”
-Jorge Mendes
Indeed, Ronaldo had mentioned quite a number of times in his career that he would willingly remain in the Spanish Capital until it is time for him to hang up his boots. Mendes, who is a close friend of Ronaldo had been an influential person in the Portuguese superstar’s life as his footballing journey began and has been one of the main contributors to the player Ronaldo is today.
The Portuguese footballer, who turns 32 in February, ended the year on a high-note scoring a hat-trick in the Club World Cup final and is currently in the middle of the winter break post which Madrid would continue their quest for the La Liga and Champions League titles riding on their unbeaten 37-game run under Zinedine Zidane.
