Rio Ferdinand says he ‘knows for a fact’ Cristiano Ronaldo ‘manufactured’ shock interview to force Man Utd transfer exit

RIO FERDINAND says he “knows for a fact” that Cristiano Ronaldo “manufactured” his explosive shock interview to force through his Manchester United exit.

Ronaldo hit out at the club for “betraying” him and making him feel like a “black sheep”, blamed for everything going wrong at Old Trafford.

The striker revealed he does not respect manager Erik ten Hag and blasted the club’s lack of progress since Sir Alex Ferguson left in 2013.

Manchester United club chiefs – including Ten Hag, chief executive Richard Arnold and football director John Murtough – sat down for initial talks to discuss their response before releasing a statement this afternoon.

Now Ronaldo’s former United team-mate Ferdinand has waded in by saying that he believes the 37-year-old’s “love affair with Man Utd is finished” now.

Ferdinand told Vibe with Five: “The book has been closed. He’s snookered the club and put them into a position where there’s no way back.

“Whether anyone at the club wanted to keep Cristiano, they can’t now after what he said.

“If the interview was two minutes long, not an hour or two, and he said the comment ‘I don’t respect the manager’, regardless of anything else, that is going to be the reason why he goes.

“I played with players like Ruud van Nistelrooy, Roy Keane, David Beckham, Jaap Stam [before I was there], all players the manager [Sir Alex Ferguson] booted out the football club because he said they thought they were players that were bigger than the club at the time for different reasons. All of them reasons by the way were nothing like what we have seen from Cristiano.

“Us, everyone in the media, fans knew this moment was coming.”

Ferdinand added: “You can’t sit here and defend that from Cristiano Ronaldo.

“Deep down and I know it for a fact, this has all been manufactured for one thing – and that’s for him to leave the club.

“I don’t feel there’s any way back, I don’t feel the club will take him back and I don’t think that he wants to come back. This is all manufactured for that reason.

“Up to this interview I would defend him, and say the club have a big responsibility to communicate better.

“How are the club going to allow Ronaldo to come back and undermine their current manager? They can’t.”