“What’s remarkable about Messi”: Erik ten Hag lands huge jibe on Cristiano Ronaldo

Former Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag has been speaking about his time at the club.

United career

The Dutch manager left Ajax to join the Old Trafford outfit in the summer of 2022.

In his first season, they finished third in the league and won the League Cup.

The following year proved more troublesome in the league, as they finished eighth but he did win the FA Cup, which also secured Europa League football.

After a defeat to West Ham United in October 2024, Ten Hag was sacked by the club.

Comments on Cristiano Ronaldo

During his time at the club, he had to deal with the decline of superstar Cristiano Ronaldo, who had rejoined the club the summer before, in 2021.

Ronaldo had an impressive first season back in Manchester but had obviously declined by his second and spectacularly left the club in November 2022 after an explosive interview with Piers Morgan, criticising many facets of the club in the most public of fashions.

Speaking to ESPN, Erik ten Hag gave his views on Ronaldo whilst he was at the club.

He explained, “the challenge is to get the team functioning, really as always. Every player is important in that and you need top players to be able to win. Every top team must embrace the top player, but the top player must work for the team. And that was simply the problem with Ronaldo.”

Ten Hag continued, “the players wanted to work for him and they looked up to him because let there be no misunderstanding about that. He is of course a tremendous player, one of the greats of all time. But that is also the reality over the last seven, eight years he simply can no longer deliver. From Juventus onwards it’s simply over.”

Elaborating further on his relationship with the Portuguese star, he added, “I naturally gave him a special status. I also went to him, I spoke to him prior to that job, I explained to him how we were going to play, what his role in that would be, what I expected of him, and what he could expect from me and from the team. But ultimately you also have to deliver yourself and he was no longer capable of pushing himself to the limit.”

On this particular issue, he finished off with the comments, “as I just said, he could no longer bring himself to push through the pain, to give everything every single day and to train at his maximum in order to get fit. And if you’re not fit in the Premier League, Champions League, or with the Portuguese national team, well, then you simply have no chance.”

Messi comparison

Ten Hag took another jibe at Ronaldo when he complimented Lionel Messi for doing what Ronaldo could not.

He added, “no one is bigger than a club or a country. Not even Cristiano Ronaldo and not even Messi. In the end, the team always comes first. And so, as I just said, every top team must embrace the top player, but the top player must yield to the team. And if he no longer does that, well then it can’t be a success and it will never become a success. Then it simply stops.”

He explained, “that is also what’s remarkable about Messi — how he worked at Argentina. That was fantastic to see. But that also required a big investment from Messi himself. Ultimately everyone went along with it and everyone worked for him but he of course gave an enormous amount back.”

Feature image Clive Brunskill via Getty Images