Cristiano Ronaldo’s emergence into a world superstar saw him win back-to-back PFA Players’ Player of the Year awards in 2007 and 2008.
The Portuguese had taken time to settle in Manchester following his move to United in 2003, but came good following his escapades at the 2006 World Cup, which made him unpopular across the country.
But it was his goals and assists for United in 2006-07 that would have made him even more unpopular with opposition fans as his 17 Premier League goals in 34 games helped him to a first title at Old Trafford. With 17 goals in other competitions, he was the club’s top scorer with Wayne Rooney.
That form won him the PFA Players’ Player of the Year award, becoming the first Portuguese player to do so.
In 2007-08 he took his game to another level becoming the leading man with a staggering 42 goals in all competitions as United won a Premier League and Champions League double.
Ronaldo scored in the European Cup final against Chelsea and was the tournament’s top scorer with eight goals.
He became just the second man to win consecutive PFA Players’ Player of the Year awards after Thierry Henry had done it in 2003 and 2004.
The forward spent one more year in English football before leaving for Real Madrid in 2009, going on to become one of the greatest players to ever play the game.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here