As reported by The Telegraph, Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solksjaer has hit back on Rio Ferdinand over his comments on Ronaldo giving instructions to the team on the sidelines during United’s match against BSC Young Boys.
Manchester United was defeated by a 1-2 scoreline by the hands of BSC Young Boys and even after scoring the first goal, they were defeated after a late strike from Theoson Siebatcheu in the very last minute of the game.
Cristiano Ronaldo opened the scoring as he was again on the scoresheet. Running between the defenders and striking a low shot from Bruno Fernandes’s beautiful cross. He was then substituted in the 72nd minute with Jesse Lingard coming on.
Must Read – BSC Young Boys vs Manchester United- Match Report
As soon as he was replaced, Cristiano Ronaldo was spotted giving instructions to the manager and his players with Bruno Fernandes also joining him later in the technical area. It was his passion that was expressed as he wanted his team to win.
Ronaldo then sat on the bench and was carefully looking at his teammates playing. It reminded us of Portugal’s Euro 2016 finals in which Ronaldo himself took the responsibility of passionately cheering and giving instructions to his teammates from the sidelines along with his coach.
Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solksjaer hit back on Rio Ferdinand by saying that the former United defender speaks on things he doesn’t know. Solksjaer was supportive of Ronaldo’s activities on the sidelines and appreciated his passion for the game.
Solksjaer said: “Rio, again you know, sometimes he comments on things he doesn’t really know. It should have been a yellow card for the boy when he brought down Nemanja. Both Bruno and Cristiano, as competitive as they are, suddenly I had them on my shoulder. They were there for a brief spell and shouted to the referee. That was the aggravation of getting a few bad decisions against us.”
“But then Cristiano sat down and Bruno sat down. We know that there is only one man allowed in that technical area and that’s either me or Michael Carrick or Mike Phelan or Kieran McKenna who is up there. That was just a spur-of-the-moment thing, over a player who should have been sent off. So I don’t have any problem with them showing some passion and then going back down. It’s not like he was coaching his players. No.”
It was good to see Solksjaer supporting Ronaldo as it was clearly seen that both Bruno and Ronaldo were trying to lift their teammates. Ronaldo was just having a tactical talk with his manager and it seems to be perfectly fine.
We will be habitual to see Ronaldo speaking and hurling instructions to his teammates for many more matches and such leadership is needed if you want to win trophies together.
