After wildest transfer window ever, Ronaldo and Messi Look to Make More History
By Doug McIntyre
FOX Sports Soccer Writer
In normal times, it’s customary to celebrate the close of European soccer’s twice-yearly transfer window by taking stock of silly season’s biggest winners and losers.
These aren’t normal times. Never before have the best two players of their generation, and in Lionel Messi’s case perhaps the greatest of all time, switched teams just weeks apart. But that’s precisely what happened in August, with Messi joining Paris Saint-Germain from Barcelona and Cristiano Ronaldo leaving Juventus and moving back to Manchester United.
This summer, PSG and Man United stand alone.
For more up-to-date news on all things Manchester United, click here to register for alerts on the FOX Sports app!
The rich getting richer is nothing new. But as it has in much of the rest of society, the almost 18-month-long pandemic has widened the gap. Before officially completing Ronaldo’s signing hours before Tuesday’s deadline, United bought English phenom Jadon Sancho and French World Cup-winning defender Rafael Varane for a combined $190 million.
Meantime, the Champions League-chasing Parisians had already lured longtime Real Madrid captain Sergio Ramos, midfielder Georginio Wijnaldum from 2019 European titlist Liverpool, and goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma, the hero of Italy’s Euro triumph, by the time Messi arrived on Aug. 10.
For more up-to-date news on all things Paris St. Germain, click here to register for alerts on the FOX Sports app!
PSG also dropped $66 million on right back Achraf Hakimi and, not insignificantly, on Tuesday turned down Real Madrid’s final, whopping $260-million bid for Kylian Mbappe. Had they accepted, it would’ve been the second-most expensive transfer fee ever paid, topping Mbappe’s last move, from Monaco, in 2018. (Mbappe is widely expected to leave for Real next summer as a free agent. For now, Real inked French teenager Eduardo Camavinga just before Tuesday’s deadline.)
We haven’t yet mentioned Manchester City, which passed on Ronaldo but splurged on Aston Villa’s Jack Grealish to the tune of $150 million. Chelsea spent almost that much on Romelu Lukaku, whom they once sold to Everton for about a quarter of that amount. The transfer fees for Grealish and Lukaku are the sixth and seventh richest in history.
And then there’s Arsenal, which actually out-spent every other English club only to lose their first three games of the new Premier League season. The Gunners currently sit last in the 20-team circuit, proving that you don’t always get what you pay for.
Still, despite some of the gaudy figures mentioned above, across-the-board spending was way down across the continent. While the super clubs were able to use their vast resources to pad already-stacked rosters, middling teams in Europe’s top five leagues — the ones whose budgets were most impacted by the loss of gate revenue caused by the global health crisis — were forced to get creative.
Maturing talents were already in fashion as the sport continues to get younger and faster, but that trend has only accelerated this summer. More and more teams targeted players who were out of contract and therefore available without a hefty price tag.
But again, the story of this transfer window is and will forever be Messi and Ronaldo. And more to the point: How will their moves impact the two superstars’ intertwined legacies?
Messi's move was more shocking, if only because he had already verbally agreed to a new five-year contract with Barcelona, the club he joined at 13 and the only professional one he’d ever represented. It was a seismic and unexpected shift for Messi after more than two decades and a haul of silverware in Spain. (Barcelona lost another highly paid attacker late Tuesday, with Antoine Griezmann loaned to former team Atlético Madrid.)
Even after Messi's brief and mostly uneventful cameo in his PSG debut on Sunday, it’s going to take time to get used to seeing him in any colors other than Barca’s. That figures to change in a hurry on the other side of the current international break. With Mbappe and Neymar alongside him, goals galore are on the horizon, and maybe even a fifth European crown for Messi, which would pull him even with Ronaldo.
As soon as Messi landed in Paris, Ronaldo wasn’t going to be satisfied staying put. His legendary competitiveness was never going to allow him to simply fade into the background while Messi, the man he’s been measured against for so long, chased one final shot at glory with PSG.
Ronaldo would’ve had better odds of adding to his honors with Champions League favorite Man City, and had they been willing to pay to release the Portuguese forward from the final year of his pact with Juve, he would probably have ended up there.
Ronaldo’s return to his old Old Trafford stomping grounds is the more romantic storyline, though. And while another European winner’s medal might be beyond him, it will be just as fascinating to watch a red-clad Ronaldo team up with Sancho, Marcus Rashford and former Real teammate Varane to try to return United to the top of the Prem for the first time since 2013.
We’re still a long way from finding out if the bets made by PSG and United this summer pay off. The overwhelming majority of games still have to be played; Ronaldo hasn’t even suited up for United yet.
But right now, with the silliest silly season ever finally over, the star power of Messi and Ronaldo still overshadows everything else, making their new employers the biggest winners of all.
One of the most prominent soccer journalists in North America, Doug McIntyre has covered United States men’s and women’s national teams in more than a dozen countries, including multiple FIFA World Cups. Before joining FOX Sports, the New York City native was a staff writer for Yahoo Sports and ESPN. Follow him on Twitter @ByDougMcIntyre.