메이저놀이터Al Nasr suffer a crushing defeat at the hands of SL Benfica.
Al Nasr suffered a 1-4 defeat in a pre-season friendly against Benfica on 21 November. Al Nasr suffered another heavy defeat against a European opponent after a 0-5 defeat against Celta Vigo earlier in the day. Angel Di Maria, Gonzalo Hamus, and Andreas Cielderuf scored the goals for Benfica.
Even more notable than the crushing defeat was the match-up between Di Maria and Ronaldo. Di Maria and Ronaldo are former Real Madrid teammates and former Manchester United teammates. Both players, who once dominated the Spanish La Liga, have now aged out of the game and are now at Benfica and Al Nasr respectively to finish their careers.
The game was highlighted by Di Maria getting in front of Ronaldo and beating him with a stunning touch. After back-to-back goals from Di Maria and Hammous gave Benfica the lead, Di Maria began to take his time against Al Nasr. With Ronaldo running in to pressure him, Di Maria took a simple touch and lifted the ball over his head to beat him. Ronaldo then committed a foul on Di Maria for pushing him and subsequently helped him to his feet.
The Daily Mail pointed out that Ronaldo was from Benfica’s rivals Sporting CP. In fact, Ronaldo was recently asked about his former teammate Di Maria playing for Benfica, and he replied, “I’m not going to talk about that. If it’s a question related to Sporting, I can talk about it, but I’m not going to talk about Di Maria.”
Meanwhile, Ronaldo has also been the subject of controversy for his comments after the last friendly against Celta Vigo. At the time, Ronaldo said that the quality of European clubs outside of the English Premier League (EPL) had dropped and that the Saudi league would be revitalised by the recent exodus of players to the Saudi Arabian league. He was criticised by fans for saying that he was the one who opened the door for the move to Saudi Arabia and that he would not continue his career in Europe. Ronaldo had spent his entire career in Europe before his move to Saudi Arabia.
