Jose Mourinho says Cristiano Ronaldo will play against USA
By Mike Dyce
There were reports that Portugal superstar Cristiano Ronaldo was facing the decision of sitting out the rest of the World Cup or risking his future and career. And everywhere Americans breathed a sigh of relief ahead of their match up against Portugal.
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According to Portuguese news source, El Confidential, surgeon Jose Carlos Noronha said, “Let your knee rest, or your future is in danger.”
It isn’t an “out of the blue” injury. Ronaldo had been dealing with leg and knee injuries the weeks leading up to the World Cup and missed several pre-World Cup friendlies.
The report also indicates that Ronaldo said: “I’m the one that says whether I’m playing or not.”
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His former manager Jose Mourinho, who is now in the same role with Chelsea FC and a fellow Portuguese citizen, thinks that Ronaldo will play and should play.
“Of course. He says he has no problems, the reports in the press, some doctor denied already to make any comments. The doctor we have to listen to is the doctor of the Portuguese national team, which says that Ronaldo is in great conditions,” Mourinho, who is serving as Yahoo’s Global Football Ambassador, said.
“And the fact, that today, people were commenting that after the training session, he was leaving the session with some ice on his knee. I think this is more than natural, because you always have a little knock here, a little knock there. And it is normal that after the recovering session you have some ice. I really don’t understand the fact that Portugal, today, they had a training session in front of ten thousand people.
“In my office, I was watching the training session live, which is something I don’t understand. And because of that, everybody could see around the world that Ronaldo was having ice in his knee. But I think, no problem. He played for ninety minutes, I saw absolutely no problem and the doctor from the Portuguese national team is saying that he’s in perfect condition and I really believe he is.”
Jose Mourinho is an exclusive analyst for Yahoo’s worldwide football coverage and www.yahoo.co.uk/worldcup is the only place to read all his expert opinions during the FIFA World Cup 2014.