Who says the club stopped him from leaving last summer? A player under contract leaves if an acceptable offer is tabled for the player. All the club linked to him never placed a serious bid that matched his valuation. Only the Saudi club tabled a bid, and he rejected the club.

The manager saying he's an important player to him is nothing but market strategy. You don't go out there and devalue your market. If Ten Hag told the media he wanted Ronaldo out of the club, that will ruin his market value.

Man U paid significant sum to acquire him, and he gets paid over £500,000 per week. The club is no charity organization that will just allow him to leave for free or at a significantly lower valuation while he's under contract. He knew that. He did that interview as a last resort to force the club to tear up his contract so that he can be free to join any club he wanted without the club paying a transfer fee. What he did was nothing but cheap blackmail. His case is not in court right now because Ferguson probably intervened.

For all the interview and all, look what he got himself into now. The Portuguese manager dropped him for the last game and everything is about him. The manager was forced to tell the media to leave Ronaldo alone just this morning. CR7 got himself into this mess!