Manchester United Transfer News: Cristiano Ronaldo Has 176 Million Reasons to Turn Down Jose Mourinho

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone and the faulty club fax machine.

Cristiano Ronaldo is probably not signing for Manchester United.

But Spanish newspaper Marca says Ronaldo could still leave Real Madrid this summer.

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After being linked with a return to United, the club he left in 2009, Ronaldo now has offers from elsewhere. Mighty offers.

Marca says there is a “firm offer” from Paris Saint-Germain on the table for Ronaldo worth around £176 million. It’s a statement from P.S.G., the Qatari-owned club, the season after it crashed out of the Champions League in humiliating fashion to Barcelona and lost the Ligue 1 title to A.S. Monaco.

P.S.G. apparently sees money as “no object” when it comes to the prospect of signing Ronaldo. But it’s not the only club in the world that can throw cash around like so much confetti.

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There is also reported interest in Ronaldo from the Chinese Super League, whose clubs would be willing and able to blow even P.S.G. out of the water should they wish. Ronaldo would instantly become by far the biggest star in that league.

A problem, though. At 32 Ronaldo is still in his prime, just about, due to his relentless commitment to physical fitness and reinvention of his own position on the pitch.

Moving to China is still, rightly or wrongly, seen as the death knell for a player’s ambitions. Could Portugal still pick Ronaldo and make him captain if he’s playing at a vastly lower standard of football than he has been used to at Real?

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It seems likely that, before the end of the summer, Real and Ronaldo will patch up their differences and continue what has been a fruitful, if fraught, relationship.

In Manchester, they will have to hold onto their memories of Ronaldo from all those years ago. It seems the prospect of the Portuguese ever returning to Old Trafford may just have disappeared altogether.