Cristiano Ronaldo is one of the best footballers of all time.
Ronaldo has been crowned Ballon d’Or winner a whopping five times, with only Lionel Messi (eight) bettering that feat.
The Portugal legend is approaching 1000 career goals having plied his trade across Europe with Sporting, Manchester United, Real Madrid and Juventus.
Ronaldo is still banging the goals in even now with Saudi Pro League side Al Nassr, despite celebrating his 40th birthday this week.
When he finally does hang up the boots, he’ll be sorely missed by a generation of fans who’ve idolised his every move.
And, what’s remarkable from an Everton perspective, is that David Moyes actually turned down the chance to bring him to Goodison Park in 2002.
Why David Moyes turned down chance to sign Cristiano Ronaldo for Everton
According to the Daily Mail, Everton were one of the clubs interested in signing Cristiano Ronaldo when he was a teenage winger at Sporting in 2002.
In fact, the Toffees had the chance to land Ronaldo’s signature for just £2m, but David Moyes and the club decided against it.
The influencing factor in their decision was they wanted to focus their attention on developing 16-year-old wonderkid Wayne Rooney, instead.
Plus, they considered Ronaldo a risk and untested in the senior game at the time, so the Portuguese attacker ended up staying in Lisbon for another year before completing a mega-money move to Manchester United, where he established himself as a Premier League great.
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Arsenal and Newcastle United also missed out on Ronaldo
Interestingly, it wasn’t just Everton who missed out on signing Ronaldo that year.
Premier League rivals Newcastle United and Arsenal were also keen on signing him and the latter were particularly advanced in their interest.
Gunners vice-chairman David Dein flew to Portugal to table a bid for Ronaldo, who trained with Arsene Wenger’s side briefly.
But that deal failed to materialise and Arsenal joined Everton in the ‘what could’ve been’ bracket.
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