Former Chelsea forward Adrian Mutu has claimed that Cristiano Ronaldo is determined to play alongside his son, Cristiano Jr, before he retires.
Ronaldo, 39, and 14-year-old Cristiano Jr both currently play for Al Nassr in Saudi Arabia, and although there has been a lot of criticism surrounding the former’s EURO 2024 performances, there’s a huge possibility he will continue playing for a while yet.
Despite his son appearing to still be at least a couple of years away from making a senior appearance after helping Al Nassr’s U13 side win the Saudi youth Premier League last season, Mutu, who paid Ronaldo a visit recently, has let slip that the former Real Madrid and Manchester United icon wants to prolong his playing days so he can share the pitch with his eldest son.
Some players just seem to age like fine wine, and it’s pretty difficult to see a time when Ronaldo will finally say goodbye to a sport he’s loved for a lifetime. As ‘football’s greatest athlete’, the five-time Ballon d’Or winner hasn’t slowed down in his goal-scoring habits, bagging 64 net bulges in 70 games since moving to Saudi Arabia at the start of 2023.
But Mutu – who scored 10 goals in 38 games for Chelsea in 2003 and 2004 before his Stamford Bridge career was effectively ended when he was banned for seven months after testing positive for cocaine – has revealed that the love of the game is not the only motivation behind Ronaldo’s prolonged playing days. Talking to Romanian outlet iAM SPORT, the 44-year-old said:
“That’s his real motivation. The fact that he wants to play an official match with his boy and that’s why he doesn’t give up.”
“Well, at Al Nassr it’s possible. If he was at another team, I don’t know, Real Madrid, it was more difficult,” Mutu continued. “But to play a half [together], in a year, I don’t think it’s impossible.”
Cristiano Ronaldo’s Career Keeps On Keeping On
Ronaldo is under contract with Al Nassr until June 2025, and he is firmly expected to remain in Riyadh next season to try to add the Saudi Pro League title to his long list of career honours.
Yet, while the same couldn’t initially be said about his international playing days, after Portugal’s recent elimination from EURO 2024 came with the expectation that he would announce his retirement following shootout defeat to France at the quarter-final stage, this no longer appears to be the case.
Ronaldo has won two titles with his country – the European Championship in 2016 and the UEFA Nations League in 2019. He would love to add a World Cup to that list, but he will be 41 when the 2026 tournament takes place in the USA, Mexico and Canada.
