Miralem Pjanic believes that his newly arrived teammate in Juventus, Cristiano Ronaldo, learnt to be the best footballer in the world from former Manchester United player Paul Scholes, during his time with the Red Devils, by doing the things simple and easy.
Ronaldo joined Juventus this summer for a staggering transfer fee of €112 million after nine years with Real Madrid. During his time with Real Madrid, he won four Champions League titles, two LaLiga titles, and four Ballons d'Or.
Pjanic also talked about Ronaldo and Paul Scholes as he said:
“But if you look at Ronaldo when he was in Manchester and then at the Ronaldo who became the best player in the world, you can see his game has changed. His game became more concrete after that. I’ve read a lot of things [Ronaldo] has said about Paul Scholes and how he trained. Everyone talked about Scholes as being extraordinary, but not because he was out there doing dummies. By keeping things simple, he made himself special. I think Ronaldo learned from players like that.”
Ronaldo arrived in Manchester United at an early age of 18 from Sporting CP in 2003 and stayed for six seasons. He then went on to represent the Red Devils in 292 games and scored 118 goals in all competitions. He won three Premier League titles, one UEFA Champions League, one FIFA Club World Cup, and the FA Cup.
Pjanic, who arrived in Juventus in 2016 from Roma at a transfer fee of €32 million, is part of the team that lost by four goals to one to Real Madrid in Cardiff in 2017. However, this time, he believes they are much better prepared, as he said:
“It is an objective for us to reach the end, to win the whole thing. We have a lot of quality and we believe in this group. One step at a time, though. Our objective right now is to finish first in the group.”
Juventus have had a great start in the UEFA Champions League, winning both of the first two matches of the group stages. Next up, they will face Manchester United in the third match of the group stage at Old Trafford.
Meanwhile, in Serie A, they are currently at the top of the table with twenty-five points from nine games, with an unbeaten streak of eight games.