Ten years ago, Ronaldo was returning to Brazil. After his contract with AC Milan expired, the Fenômeno recovered from a knee injury in his home country and ended up signing for Corinthians.
This story is told by ESPN Brasil, in an article which brings a lot of details from one of the transfers which had most impact in the history of Brazilian football.
Among the people who were interviewed by ESPN, there’s Fabiano Farah, who was the player’s agent at the time. He claimed that many clubs have made approaches to sign Ronaldo as a free agent in 2008, but few made a real offer.
“There has never been negotiations with Flamengo. We had several offers from abroad, but from Brazil it was only Corinthians. At the time we were negotiating with Manchester City,” Farah told ESPN.
Ronaldo turned out to have a pretty good spell at Corinthians, with 35 goals in 68 appearances, having scored some beauties and winning a couple of titles. However, given his physical condition at the time, it’s unlikely he would have been able to succeed in the Premier League.
