Ronaldinho's next move

[The Erectile Banana]

Don't know about Ronaldinho.

I get the feeling he is slightly past his prime and he has often looked disinterested and out of shape in recent times.

Having said that if he was available I'd still be tempted. Not sure if he'd like the physical nature of the premiership either. He was moaning a lot in the CL last season when Momo et al were getting physical.

[Darth Marty]

Ronnie would be awesome at Arsenal. Arsenal play football suberbly at present and whilst I think we will beat them to the league, you have to say their style of footie is ****ing ace!
So no...id rather keep Stevie.

[Parm]

what i heard is that eto'o is the problem, the stories from this summer are true according to my contact, one of them is out in the summer, and most at barca want eto'o out. he is supposedly so arrogant and stupid that it really can upset the team. there where also loads of stories of how he's been pissing all his money away on useless crap, diamonds, clothes, cars, etc... story is is that he hasn't got much left of his HUGE wages by the end of the month...

is close to eidur so i trust this info...

blimey, just how does he get paid a month?

[Dan]

blimey, just how does he get paid a month?

Bank transfer or cheque I'd say

[AFII]

Barcelona board puts Ronaldinho up for sale
tribalfootball.com - October 31, 2007

Barcelona's board are ready to sell Ronaldinho.

While the official line is that "no offers will be considered", AS says several board sources are suggesting the opposite and that the Brazilian is on the market.

For now, no offers have arrived for Ronaldinho, but Barca won't rule out selling the former World Player of the Year in January should the right bid be made.

Directors are convinced Ronaldinho's best years are behind him and as he has only completed 90 minutes twice this season are ready to cash in.

Meanwhile, Barca captain Carles Puyol insists they need Ronaldinho: "He is most important for us.

"If we want to win trophies, we need him to stay. He may not always play well, but he has a good attitude and is working hard."

[Slim]

http://football.guardian.co.uk/News_...202920,00.html

Chelsea are the only ones in for him now according to today's Guardian.

Chelsea alone in Ronaldinho race


Dominic Fifield
Thursday November 1, 2007
The Guardian


The chances of Ronaldinho swapping Barcelona for Chelsea have improved after a Milan source said their priority was to sign a striker rather than a playmaker, which they already possess in Kaka. The Italian club were perceived to be Chelsea's primary rivals in the pursuit of the Brazilian, who is becoming marginalised at Camp Nou. However, a source at Milan has confirmed that an attacking midfielder would not be their priority either during the mid-winter transfer window or at the end of the current season.

Instead the source at Milan, who are currently 13th in Serie A after a dismal start to the domestic season, said the club would target a ball-winning centre-forward in the mould of Didier Drogba, after seeing Ronaldo, Filippo Inzaghi and Alberto Gilardino struggle this season.
That would, theoretically, leave Chelsea as the main suitors for Ronaldinho, with their owner, Roman Abramovich, having long targeted the Brazilian as a player who could supply the guile and effervescence he has been seeking at Stamford Bridge. Barca have valued him at £43m but would probably accept a substantial offer.

Abramovich met the player's brother, Roberto Assis in August and Chelsea are one of the few clubs able to match Ronaldinho's and Barça's financial demands. Other senior figures at Stamford Bridge are understood to be doubtful over whether a move for the 27-year-old would be advisable, particularly given the Premiership club's desire to streamline its business.

[Shanks65]

Barça ponder the unthinkable: life without Ronnie

After his poor form led to him being booed by his own fans, Ronaldinho's Barça days could be numbered.

Sid LoweNovember 2, 2007 12:01 AM guardian

Barcelona's vice-president, Ferrán Soriano, said yesterday that "at no stage" had Barcelona even contemplated selling Ronaldinho. Meanwhile their coach, Frank Rijkaard, was quick to offer the Brazilian his support as speculation mounted that he could leave the coldness of Camp Nou for the warm embrace of his long-term suitors Chelsea, although Ronaldinho is understood to be keen on a move to Milan only. But Soriano was being disingenuous; wielding the axe has never been Rijkaard's style and there was a Freudian slip from the Dutchman when he expressed confidence the player could come back after having hit "rock bottom".

It was a crushing if inadvertent analysis of the Brazilian's form, revealing an opinion widely held at Camp Nou. Ronaldinho's future at Barça grows increasingly insecure as his performances drift from the glittering displays that made him Fifa World Player for two successive years.

This season 11 Barça players have had more minutes than Ronaldinho - good news for Rangers, whom they meet in the Champions League next Wednesday, bad news if you are a Catalan. Having previously never been substituted more than six times in an entire season, he has already been replaced, ineffective and exhausted, in four out of six league games. But, despite showing positive signs last night against Valladolid when the 27-year-old scored from open play for the first time this season, doubts remain.

When he was left out of the squad with injury, Barça enjoyed their best run of form, playing quicker and more incisive football. Little over a month ago, an unnamed member of Rijkaard's backroom staff complained that "Ronaldinho can no longer get away from his man" and at the moment he looks slow, leaden-footed and unhappy. Against Almeria at the weekend the Camp Nou crowd whistled and booed him.

Nor is this a new phenomenon. Twenty-one league goals last season did not disguise the fact that Ronaldinho was increasingly out of shape. He attended fewer than 50% of the club's training sessions last season and was clearly overweight, while the constant travelling and the conveyor belt of sponsorship had left him burnt out. He appeared to have lost the enthusiasm that made him unique, going so far as to contemplate international retirement in an attempt to recover his former freshness.

It took its toll: Barça lost the league title in humiliating fashion to a Real Madrid side that had seemed dead and buried and, as the season closed, the board discussed the possibility of selling Ronaldinho for the first time. Barça have even employed an agent to help them devise a strategic plan to shift the Brazilian.

Internal politics and a serious dressing- room divide between Ronaldinho and Samuel Eto'o, explosively brought to the surface by the Cameroonian's public tirade about a "civil war" last season, nudged him closer to the exit door. Ronaldinho was seen as the protégé of Sandro Rosell, the former Nike Brazil executive and Barcelona vice-president who was forced to leave the club after a public fallout with the president, Joan Laporta; Eto'o, meanwhile, was the apple of Laporta's eye.

Worse, many board members detected the onset of the same lax attitudes that heralded the collapse of galacticism at Real Madrid, with Johan Cruyff, Barça's Cardinal Richelieu and the power broker lurking in the Camp Nou shadows, encouraging them to get shot of the Brazilians.

The club attempted to nudge towards a power base they felt they could control. Thiaggo Motta was forced to depart and Barça did all they could to find a club for the Brazilian-born Portuguese international Deco. Meanwhile the summer signings - Eric Abidal, Yaya Touré, Thierry Henry - strengthened a French-speaking nucleus, tipping the balance towards Eto'o, and the "lifelong" contract that Laporta had promised Ronaldinho simply never materialised.

The tactic was designed to do one of two things: isolate Ronaldinho from "bad" influences, bringing him back into line or, failing that, force him to rethink his future. Either way, Barça would emerge winners. They would not actively try to sell him but, if offers arrived for a player valued at £43m, Barça would listen.

If the lack of concrete offers was one reason why Ronaldinho was not sold, his commercial value was another, some on the Barça board reasoning that on exhibition games alone his presence could earn the club an additional €10m a year. The hope that he would recover was another: for the first time in four seasons Ronaldinho had had a summer break, after pulling out of the Copa América. That he was not fresh convinced many at Barcelona that exhaustion was an excuse rather than the real reason for Ronaldinho's dip in form.

When Ronaldinho was accused of lax living earlier this season, the story appeared to have been deliberately filtered by the club to make sure that Barça's fans knew that, if he was not performing, it was his fault not theirs. Ronaldinho's brother and agent, Roberto de Assis, denounced a "conspiracy" against him.

There is an urgency to complete any deal before next summer when Ronaldinho could take advantage of Fifa article 17, which allows players to break a contract after three years if they signed when under the age of 28 or two years if they signed when 28 or over, to buy himself out of his contract for just €20m (£13m) - something his brother is studying.

On and off season

Aug 26 Racing Santander 0-0 Not in squad

Sept 2 Barcelona 3-1 Athletic Bilbao Starts and scores twice, but subbed after 78min

Sept 16 Osasuna 0-0 Barça Subbed 66min

Sept 19 Barcelona 3-0 Lyon Subbed 66min

Sept 22 Barcelona 2-1 FC Sevilla Not in squad

Sept 26 Barcelona 4-1 Real Zaragoza Not in squad

Sept 29 Levante 1-4 Barcelona Not in squad

Oct 2 VfB Stuttgart 0-2 Barça Subbed 82min

Oct 7 Barça 3-0 Atlético Mad'd Subbed 81 min

Oct 20 Villarreal 3-1 Barcelona Not in squad

Oct 23 Rangers 0-0 Barcelona Plays 90 minutes

Oct 28 Barcelona 2-0 Almeria Subbed 75min

Nov 1 Valladolid 1-1 Barça Plays 90 min, scores