Opinion – Tostão: Conversation at the beginning of his career already revealed an ambitious Ronaldo

Around the 1994 World Cup, I saw Ronaldo playing for Cruzeiro, aged 17, and I was delighted. It looked like a phenomenon, as it was, one of the greatest in football history. At the time, he said, in an interview, that he should be called up and that he would not be a starter because Brazil already had an exceptional pair of strikers, Romário and Bebeto. In the final, against Italy, during extra time, Ronaldo should have entered, not Viola.

The other day, a reporter took Ronaldo to my house to do a story. During the conversation, he, already ambitious, like the great stars, asked me if I had bought the apartment with the money I had earned in football. I didn’t imagine that, in a very short time, I could buy an equal one with a month’s salary.

Ronaldo left, after the report, but came back because he had forgotten his wallet. Freud would say that it was a faulty act, an unconscious desire to return, perhaps to talk a little longer, without the presence of the journalist.

The businessman Ronaldo is now the owner of Cruzeiro’s football, when he bought 90% of the shares in the club, which, days before, had become a club-company. Other Brazilian clubs should follow the same path, a hope, but it is not the only one or the certainty of success. Bayern Munich, one of the most organized and successful clubs in the world, sold 49% of its shares to companies and, with 51%, remains as the club’s administrator.

It has not yet been detailed and explained how the organization and command functions will be. Transparency is essential. I hope it works out.

​The clipboard does not play

All players on a team need to have a tactical reference, know their positions, functions and main movements on the field. This is fundamental, which does not mean that you have to play the same way from start to finish.

The great players and the great teams are the ones that, without losing tactical organization and references, surprise, innovate and do different things, in the same match or between one game and another. This ability to innovate is characteristic of great talents, both individual and collective. Repetition is important to improve technique, but when excessive it leads to stagnation and inefficiency.

The teams that change the way they play during the game are very difficult to be labeled, drawn on a drawing board. They are defensive and offensive, pragmatic and creative, prudent and bold. Clipboard does not play.

As important as the technical details, strategies and statistics is the quality of the show. Coaches, athletes, managers, sports writers and those passionate about the game should prioritize football that is well played, enjoyable, without violence, without excessive fouls and without so many complaints. Troubled football, as we often see in many games across Brazil, is neither efficient nor entertaining. It’s a horror, which impoverishes the sport.

New ways

I hope that Brazilian clubs and the country find new paths. Time passes, little changes, and we still have to live with the deniers. Football remains, on average, lackluster, and for decades the enormous social inequality and so many other miseries have not diminished. Meanwhile, even more at Christmas, the speeches against prejudice, poverty and the corrupt increase. Many who protest, especially politicians, are the ones who do everything to destroy the fight against corruption. Talking is easy. Hard is to do.