United Dismiss City's Ronaldo Push

CelticKing · Sep 7, 2008

United Dismiss City's Ronaldo Push

Manchester United chief executive David Gill is not concerned with local rivals Manchester City's recent takeover, nor their potential bid of £135 million for Cristiano Ronaldo...

With the dust finally settled on Real Madrid's pursuit of Cristiano Ronaldo - at least for the next few months - another club has crept out of the woodwork with an audacious mention of a move for the Portuguese ace and, as if the very notion wasn't ridiculous enough in itself, it's Manchester City.

Long thought of as United's little brother and the 'real' club of Manchester - as opposed to the global brand Sir Alex Ferguson's men have become - the Citizens were the subject of the largest takeover in the history of football on the first day of this month, and have since gone about flaunting their wealth without shame in the media.

Almost every top name in the sport has been mentioned as a potential target for Dr. Sulaiman Al-Fahim and his Abu-Dhabi United Group, chiefly Ronaldo, who the billionaire believes to be worth well more than Real Madrid were ever prepared to offer.

A £135 million move across Manchester has, however, been greeted with little more than a laugh from Unied. Chief executive David Gill told BBC Radio Five Live of his disbelief following the comment and also questioned the ethics of the new City owners. "It was an interesting comment, I think it's a fan's-type comment. It's interesting when Alex [Ferguson] mentioned the Dimitar Berbatov signing in advance that complaints were made to the Premier League," said Gill, referring to a formal complaint lodged by Tottenham Hotspur chairman Daniel Levy over United's pursuit of the Bulgarian, which was controversially withdrawn following completion of the deal at the eleventh hour on deadline day.

The United chief disputed the validity of the comments but conceded a potential offer in that region would be considered but, in all likelihood, face rejection. "He [Al-Fahim] mentioned [Fernando] Torres and [Cesc] Fabregas in the same article so I think we will treat that with a pinch of salt. I have never met the gentleman. That is a fantastic amount of money and would turn the industry upside down so I can't believe he is serious at those sorts of levels.

"Ultimately we would discuss any offer with Alex and the owners, as that sort of money is very large for one person. But we are not in the market to sell our best players."

Regarding the Berbatov issue, Gill was eager to dispel recent rumours that United had acted in breach of Premier League rules or even bribed Tottenham to remove their complaint to the Football Association, as was recently claimed. "We are very comfortable with how the whole thing went," he insisted. "There were allegations made, we are comfortable that how we approached it was entirely correct and within the rules.

"It came together on Monday and the agent was given permission for the player to come up to Manchester, we arranged the plane for him and Alex met him at the airport. It's true to say when the medical commenced we had not finished all the final negotiations with Spurs but both parties were confident they would be completed to everyone's satisfaction.

"We are very comfortable we had permission to do what we did and it was clear to Tottenham and Daniel Levy in particular that he knew what we were doing and if that wasn't the case we wouldn't have done it."

The United chief believes the squad needs just one finishing touch: to secure the loan signing of Carlos Tevez as permanent. "One other bit of business we will do is finalise the Carlos Tevez deal and then the composition of the squad will be first class," he said.
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United Dismiss City's Ronaldo Push

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