Cristiano Ronaldo, the harbinger of Serie A’s renaissance

Since last week’s announcement that Cristiano Ronaldo would leave Real Madrid looking for a new challenge in Serie A playing for Juventus FC after winning everything with the Spanish giants, many have suggested that this could be the opportunity that Italian football as a whole has been looking for during the past decade.

The match-fixing scandal that took place back in 2006 which affected Juventus and AC Milan more than most, left Serie A on the brink of becoming a second class tournament and left behind the image of grandeur it  had during the 1980s and 90s.

Back then was the era of true greats in Italian Calcio, that there was no other tournament in Europe with the quality to rival it. Are there echoes with the day Maradona was presented in Napoli this week even if the player himself requested a quieter introduction.

And much like the feeling was with Diego Maradona, people have blind faith in Cristiano Ronaldo because they know that he will deliver goals and trophies. It will encourage a slipstream. Players who are at the top of their game in Europe have a greater desire than before to come and play in Serie A just to play either with or against Cristiano Ronaldo.

The Portuguese star’s arrival to the Vecchia Signora is possibly the best news Italian football has gotten since the Brazilian Ronaldo’s arrival from FC Barcelona to Internazionale Milano back in 1997.

, we all remember that time fondly as well, a period of which legends about the ‘Phenomenon’ laying waste to defenders across all stadiums in Italy were told. Today we feel the same way because we are all certain that Cristiano Ronaldo will keep playing at his best despite being 33 or despite having won so many accolades throughout his illustrious career.

But just to make clear why we say that Cristiano Ronaldo’s arrival in Italy means the Serie A Renaissance, here are all the records that he can break in the following years for Juventus. The first and even perhaps the easiest one is the record for most goals in a single Serie A season that his new teammate Gonzalo Higuain set in the 2015-2016 season playing for Napoli, back then the Argentine player scored 36 goals in a single tournament.

Ronaldo also has a record within his grasp that is 91 years old, which is the most goals in a single season from a Juventus player in Serie A held by Hungarian striker Ferenc Hirzer. Italian football legends Silvio Piola and Omar Sivori have the record for most goals in a Serie A match with 6, Ronaldo could beat that without breaking a sweat. Goal scoring legends Gunnar Nordahl and Giuseppe Meazza hold the record for most hat-tricks in Serie A history with 17 each, quite the small amount for Ronaldo considering he has scored 51 hat-tricks throughout his career.

Finally, the record that perhaps could be the most unattainable but only due to Cristiano Ronaldo’s age, is Alessandro del Piero’s 42 Champions League goals playing for Juventus. But hey, this is Ronaldo we are talking about and so far he has proven that nothing is impossible for him. Looking at everything he has given to football in the last 15 years he has been a professional, there is very little doubt that many of the records we have mentioned here could be broken by Cristiano Ronaldo because he is just that great of a player.

All we can say after looking at his press conference this Monday and listening to his words is that we can be certain that Cristiano Ronaldo will perform at the top of his game for a few more seasons at Juventus and there is no doubt about it. All Real Madrid fans know how much they have lost with Ronaldo’s departure, it will be hard for the club to return to their old glory without one of the best players in football history still by their side.