Cristiano Ronaldo has backed his former club Real Madrid to win the Champions League again this season.
Los Blancos are the defending champions after beating Borussia Dortmund 2-0 in last season's final at Wembley and have lifted the trophy 15 times. Ronaldo has won the tournament five times in his career, four of which came during his time at Madrid.
And the 39-year-old made a confident prediction that Real will triumph again this season as he takes home the awards for Best Middle Eastern Player and All-Time Top Scorer at the Dubai Globe Soccer Awards.
“Teams always have their good and bad moments,” Ronaldo said. “Now Manchester City have gone through a bad moment, but they will come back. I would tell City to their players to show more and not talk now.”
“The big players know where the problem is. As for Madrid, in the end they are always there, you can never leave them for dead. I would bet on Real Madrid winning the Champions League again because all the other teams are afraid.” when they play Madrid at the Bernabeu.
“I would bet on Madrid because they always come back. They had problems at the beginning but then they improved.” Madrid currently sit 20th in the league stages of this season's tournament, having collected just nine points from six matches.
That means they are still in the play-off zone with just two games remaining, meaning they could be eliminated completely if the results don't go their way. However, Ronaldo remains confident in his former team's chances and also welcomed manager Carlo Ancelotti.
“When people ask me why Carlo is a good coach, I always say he knows how to negotiate with players one by one,” said Ronaldo, after playing under Ancelotti between 2013 and 2015 during his first spell in charge of Madrid .
“That is the key to success, so it is no coincidence that he has won everything. In addition to being a good man, he is also a very intelligent man.”
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