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Ronaldo's slave claim sparks fury
11.07.08
Cristiano Ronaldo has risked the wrath of Manchester United and their supporters by claiming that the club are treating him like a slave.
Sepp Blatter said earlier in the week that footballers were victims of what he saw as "modern slavery" and the Portuguese winger claimed today that the FIFA president was right.
Blatter, referring to Ronaldo's desire to join Real Madrid, insisted players should be allowed to play where they wanted.
The striker, who has failed to commit himself to United and given mixed messages about Real's obvious interest, backed Blatter's stand but refused to shed any more light on the proposed transfer.
"I agree with the comments of the president of FIFA. What he said is right," he told Portuguese channel TVI. "At the moment there is no agreement with Real , but I do not know where I will begin next season."
The League Managers' Association fear there could be long-term repercussions from Blatter's views.
Chief executive Richard Bevan said: "His remarks are extremely illconsidered. There are no benefits to clubs or players in what he said.
"The transfer system, regulated by FIFA, is the cornerstone of developing talent. We also have the important issue of sanctity of contract. Ignoring the nonsensical comparison of a player on £120,000 a week to a modern slave, it's a very poor choice of words."
Reader views (2)
As the start of each football season approaches - without fail -- Real Madrid and Barcelona would stir things up by announcing they must get so and so into their team. And the whole furore would break out with the so and so's quoted as saying how flattered they are by the attention and their manager gong read in their faces cursing the supposedly elite clubs' unwanted attention on their stars. Then us the public would get incensed too and take sides. Some of us would curse the stars as getting big headed etc etc conveniently forgetting they are only trying to make as much as possible out of their relatively short career span. Then when emotions get so whipped up the season starts and everyone's hooked up to see the ending of the pre-season saga. Judging from all this a suspicion lingers that the whole thing has been stage-managed to ensure another successful football season.
- Rizal J Maris, Jakarta, Indonesia
Must be tough poor lad, footballers behave like spoilt kids. Not a great fan of United but for all of football these remarks stink and I almost feel sorry for the club.
Slaves...my god!
- Matt Crane, Worthing
