Morocco Portugal live as Cristiano Ronaldo enters match in World Cup quarterfinals.

He has never been particularly accomplished when it comes to hiding his feelings. If he is unhappy in any way, he makes sure everyone knows about it. He cannot go through the pretence when, inside, there is something bordering on revulsion that he, Cristiano Ronaldo, is not quite getting what he wants.

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It is the same when he is feeling good about himself. Oh, he really wants us to know about it then. His chin is jutted out. He will be nodding his head in appreciation of his own brilliance: the nearest, if you remember Happy Days, that football has ever had to The Fonz.

What you don’t get is someone who has learned how to mask disappointment in the way that, say, Lionel Messi often does when his usual sureness of touch deserts him.

Nobody should have been too surprised, therefore, that Ronaldo left the scene of Portugal’s latest assignment, their 2-1 defeat to South Korea, wearing an expression that will have been familiar to Manchester United’s supporters during his crabby last few months at the club.

At least Fernando Santos, Portugal’s manager, had the nerve to go through with substituting him, when every experienced Ronaldo-watcher would have known it would provoke a reaction. Ronaldo made such a meal out of leaving the pitch that Cho Gue-sung, the opposition striker, was emboldened enough to tell him to hurry up. Ronaldo gave him the shush gesture, lowered himself into the dugout and spent the rest of the match with an expression on his face that had a clear message: Do Not Disturb.

He did not look too happy at half-time either, bearing in mind his reaction to hearing the whistle was to bang his hands against his legs in anger and pull the captain’s armband off his arm. Ronaldo had been at fault for South Korea’s equaliser and, at the other end of the pitch, he had only sporadically troubled the opposition defence. The five-time Ballon d’Or winner was muttering away to himself as he headed to the tunnel.

Everyone can have a poor game, of course, and even the genuine greats — of which Ronaldo is undoubtedly one — know what it is like to suffer a lapse of mediocrity. This is the thing about being a category-A player: they expect so much of themselves, there is always the risk of disappointment.

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Nonetheless, it has been difficult to observe Portugal’s progress in Group H without the feeling that, if Ronaldo intends to leave his mark on this tournament, he is going to have to do much better than we have seen thus far. To put it bluntly, he needs to up his game. And that’s the thing: who can say with absolute certainty these days that he is capable of going to a higher level?

OK, perhaps that is a slightly harsh critique when Portugal have qualified as group winners, with a last-16 fixture to come against Switzerland. Too much can be made of one bad match and, if there is one thing we should all know about Ronaldo, it is that he will already be visualising scoring the decisive goal: the celebration, the strut, the glory. 

Yet it is also becoming easier to understand, having observed Portugal’s opening three fixtures, why the only clubs who are actively trying to sign Ronaldo now he is a free agent come from Saudi Arabia rather than one of the European superpowers trying to persuade him they offer greater adventures.

Ronaldo has not been bad, as such, in this World Cup; he just hasn’t looked like the player he wants to be. Defenders are no longer worried that he might leave them for dead in a blur of improvisational brilliance. Ronaldo has morphed into more of a target man, instructing his team-mates that he wants the ball to be crossed in from the wings, so he can put that prodigious leap to good effect. It makes him a dangerous opponent when he is such an accomplished penalty-box player. But the old magic is no longer there, no matter how much he wants to believe differently.

Where to go next on The Athletic…

His World Cup so far includes a penalty during Portugal’s 3-2 win over Ghana followed by two appearances in which he has huffed and puffed without ever really going above six out of 10.

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In the process, Ronaldo has passed up the opportunity to draw level with Eusebio, with nine goals, as his country’s leading scorer in World Cup history. It might not seem the biggest thing, but don’t underestimate how hungry Ronaldo is — ravenous even — to accumulate all these personal records. Just consider his attempt to claim a non-existent touch after Bruno Fernandes’ opening goal against Uruguay in Portugal’s second group match. Some would criticise Ronaldo for that; others would say it is part of the mentality that separates him from most other players.

100 – Cristiano Ronaldo has attempted exactly 100 shots at World Cup tournaments, the first player to reach this total since full shot data is available (1966). Range.

— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) December 2, 2022

Then we come to Portugal’s final group game and, for Ronaldo, a personal ordeal given that he accidentally set up South Korea’s first goal by turning his back on the ball at a corner. It was an unusual mistake from such a brave player, almost as though he was trying not to get hurt. The ball ricocheted off his back and Kim Young-gwon gratefully turned it in for South Korea’s equaliser.

Ronaldo did not hold up an apologetic hand. His first reaction was actually to turn to the nearest Portuguese defenders and fix them with a stare that made it clear he thought it was they, not him, who ought to accept the blame. 

He seemed to be making the same point when Pepe, one of the few players with the authority to challenge him, chipped in. Ronaldo said his bit and we will never know how Pepe responded because he put his hand in front of his mouth to make sure nobody could make out the words.

It would be nice to think that a player with Pepe’s worldliness preferred not to indulge him. Again, though, this is just who Ronaldo is, and what has helped him achieve greatness in the first place. He cannot believe he could ever be responsible or fallible or non-superhuman because for most of his life he has been able to shape football matches to his will.

And he might do again. It is just difficult after what we have seen from Cristiano Ronaldo, superstar, in the group stages to believe this is going to be the World Cup that he would necessarily like it to be.

(Top photo: Manuel Reino Berengui/DeFodi Images via Getty Images)

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