Diego Forlan's Insight on Cristiano Ronaldo's Role with Portugal
Diego Forlan knows what it is to live off goals and movement in the penalty area. That is exactly why his verdict on Cristiano Ronaldo’s current role with Portugal lands with such weight.
Speaking on ESPN’s La Casa del Kun, the former Manchester United forward and 2010 World Cup Golden Ball winner stripped the debate back to basics: Ronaldo’s still lethal in the box, but his static positioning is choking Portugal’s attack.
“As a striker, the problem is that Cristiano is in the center, he is who he is, he is there as a No.9, and he stays there to take advantage of the goal because he no longer goes out to look for the ball, but he ends up conditioning Portugal,” Forlan said.
In other words, Ronaldo stands, the centre-backs stand, and the game around them grinds into a predictable pattern.
“It’s the typical situation where we used to say, ‘I’m staying here because I’m close to the goal to score,’ but you don’t understand that you end up hurting your team because both center backs stay there, you don’t move,” Forlan explained. “The center backs stay put, one becomes a reference point and the other is left out. You have no one who can get to you because you start closing down that space.”
Forlan’s criticism is not about ego or legacy. It is about geometry and rhythm. With Ronaldo planted as a fixed No.9, Portugal lose the constant movement that drags defenders out of shape and opens corridors for runners. The pitch shrinks. The opposition back line relaxes. The game becomes easier to read.
And this is a squad that should be stretching opponents to breaking point.
- Bruno Fernandes
- Bernardo Silva
- Rafael Leao
These are players who thrive when the spaces between the lines crack open, when a centre-back is tempted into no-man’s land and a full-back gets dragged inside. Forlan’s view is that a small shift in Ronaldo’s mentality could unleash all of that.
“If he moved a little to the wings, the others could get in and he could be involved,” he said. “That’s where Portugal falters because they don’t explode because everything ends up going to one side, which is actually a funnel. I wouldn’t say it’s a problem, it’s about making him understand. Telling him: ‘Move, get out of there so you can do something’.”
The image is striking: an attack funneled into a narrow, predictable channel, instead of flaring out across the final third. Forlan is not calling for Ronaldo to be dropped, or even radically reinvented. He is asking him to move – to drag a centre-back wide, to vacate the central lane for a late-arriving midfielder, to turn himself from a static reference point into a moving target.
That nuance now lands squarely on the desk of Roberto Martinez.
Portugal have done their first job and reached the round of 32, where Croatia await. Ronaldo has already underlined that his finishing instincts remain intact; give him a sight of goal and he still punishes teams. The question is what happens in the long stretches between those moments.
Against elite opposition, the “bottleneck” Forlan describes becomes more dangerous. Top defences do not panic when a 39-year-old striker stands between their centre-backs. They hold their line, keep their distances, and wait for the game to come to them. If Portugal’s attacks keep funnelling into that same central zone, they risk becoming exactly what those defenders want: predictable, easy to contain, easier still to counter.
This is the tension Martinez must manage. On one side, the aura and penalty-box menace of a five-time Ballon d’Or winner who remains the emotional axis of the national team. On the other, the need to give creative freedom and space to a gifted supporting cast entering their prime.
Forlan’s message slices through the sentimentality. It is not about diminishing Ronaldo’s status. It is about adapting it.
The former Uruguay star has lived the life of a striker who both scores and serves the system. His advice is simple, almost old-fashioned: move a little wider, shift a line, create room for others to burst through. It sounds small. It can change everything.
Whether Ronaldo is prepared to make that concession, this late in a career built on being the centre of gravity, will shape Portugal’s ceiling in this tournament. He has already proved he can still find the net.
Now the real test begins: can he also find the space for everyone else?
