Al-Nassr suffered a huge blow to their hopes of winning the Saudi Professional League after a goalless draw with lowly Al-Feiha, and Cristiano Ronaldo left the pitch in anger after a frustrating performance on Sunday.
Ronaldo experiencing difficult moments, such as this weekend’s match against Al-Feiha. The player, happy after leaving his difficult experience at Manchester United, confronted several opponents to reproach them for their attitude on the pitch. “You don’t want to play,” he told them bluntly to their faces.
Leaders Al-Ittihad did not waste the opportunity to broaden the gap with Al-Nassr to three points with the last seven remainings, with a victory 2-1 against Al-Wehda. Al-Ittihad had an advantage also in a head-to-head result with Al-Nassr.
Ronaldo, 38, who joined Al-Nassr in January in a contract estimated by media to be worth more than $218 million (200 million euros), hit a ball into the hands of goalkeeper Vladimir Stojkovic, who kissed the ball in the 68th minute.
Stojkovic seemed to cast a spell on the ball as the Portugal captain fired twice over the bar in the space of six minutes, and Brazilian Anderson Talisca, the league’s top scorer, was ineffective also.
Ronaldo seemed angry while leaving the pitch after his goal tally stopped at 11 goals in 10 league games, and he took off the captain’s armband and left it in his hand. Al-Nassr coach Rudi Garcia was not pleased with the performance, or the result.
The result is definitely bad and we are not happy, the French coach told the Saudi Sports Company (SSC) through a translator. He added, I don’t feel satisfied with the players’ performance. I asked them to play at the same level as the last game in the 5-0 victory against Al-Adalah, but this didn’t happen.
Al-Nassr, who won the title for the last time in 2019, will play a crucial game next week against Al-Hilal, the defending champion and fourth in the standings, which may decide the race for the title.
Garcia added, there are seven games left, we will try to recover, and we realize that it’s not easy after we lost two points, but everything is possible.”
Al-Feiha posted on Twitter an edited image of their captain Sami Al-Khaibari sitting in front of Ronaldo at a chess table, recalling a famous advertisement featuring rivals Lionel Messi and Cristiano.
The image captioned “checkmate,” drew more than 2.1 million views.
