<p>As news of <strong>Cristiano</strong> <strong>Ronaldo&#8217;s (£12.5m) return</strong> <strong>to</strong> <strong>Manchester United</strong> settles in for <strong>Fantasy Premier League</strong> managers, <a href="https://twitter.com/ChrisTanFPL"><strong>Chris Tan</strong></a> details what it could mean for our current FPL squads and beyond.</p>
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<h2></h2>
<h2>How Much Will Ronaldo Cost in FPL?</h2>
<p><strong>Cristiano Ronaldo has been priced at £12.5m</strong>. Both <strong>Mohamed Salah and Harry Kane</strong> also started the season at <strong>£12.5m</strong>. <strong>Kevin De Bruyne</strong> and <strong>Bruno</strong> <strong>Fernandes</strong> were the tier below at <strong>£12.0m</strong>; and <strong>Romelu</strong> <strong>Lukaku</strong> was given an <strong>£11.5m</strong> price tag.</p>
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<h2><strong>What can a 36-year-old Ronaldo add to the Title Contenders?</strong></h2>
<p>Looking at <strong>Ronaldo&#8217;s career <a href="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/opta/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="1" title="FPL Stats by OPTA - Player and Team Stats">stats</a></strong> draws my attention to a few key points.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Playing Time</strong> – despite his advanced years, <strong>Ronaldo</strong> appears to be growing fitter with age. Based on his appearance <a href="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/opta/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="1" title="FPL Stats by OPTA - Player and Team Stats">stats</a>, you’d expect him to play the <strong>majority of league games</strong>. He&#8217;s a 90 minute man and rarely misses a game. He started at least 30 league games each season at Juventus and averaged just under 90 minutes per appearance.</li>
<li><strong>Performance</strong> – he’s not quite at peak Madrid levels, but <strong>it’s been over 12 years since he scored less than 20 league goals in a season</strong>. In Serie A, <strong>he’s averaged 27 goals a season</strong> (21, 31 and 29) in a notoriously defensive league. Although not a prolific assister, he has them in his locker (8, 5 and 2).</li>
<li><strong>Per 90 minutes</strong> – these <a href="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/opta/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="1" title="FPL Stats by OPTA - Player and Team Stats">stats</a> are elite. He’s almost at <strong>a goal per 90 minutes</strong> (0.76, 0.82 and 0.85) where 0.5 would be considered very good. To put it into perspective, in the Premier League last season, <strong>Jamie Vardy (£10.5m), Mohamed Salah (£12.6m) and Harry Kane (£12.4m)</strong> had the best <a href="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/opta/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="1" title="FPL Stats by OPTA - Player and Team Stats">stats</a> in the league with 0.62, 0.61 and 0.60 goal per 90 <a href="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/opta/" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c="1" title="FPL Stats by OPTA - Player and Team Stats">stats</a> respectively.</li>
<li><strong>Expected Data</strong> – he tends to consistently outperformed his xG stats (-1.7, +4.3, +2.5). He’s an excellent finisher.</li>
</ul>
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<h2><strong>What Position Will Ronaldo Play for Man United?</strong></h2>
<p>He began as a <strong>pacey winger</strong>, but in his later years at <strong>Man</strong> <strong>United</strong> then at Madrid, he evolved into a <strong>centre forward</strong>. The diagram below illustrates that he is very much a centre forward now.</p>
<div id="attachment_38055" style="width: 345px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-38055" class="size-full wp-image-38055" src="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Position-Played.png" alt="" width="335" height="396" srcset="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Position-Played.png 335w, https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Position-Played-254x300.png 254w" sizes="(max-width: 335px) 100vw, 335px" /><p id="caption-attachment-38055" class="wp-caption-text">Ronaldo&#8217;s position played for Juventus last season | Source: transfermarkt</p></div>
<p>This is ideal for <strong>Manchester United. </strong>They have an abundance of talent that can play in the wide positions but are lacking an elite number 9, particularly of Ronaldo&#8217;s calibre. He is also comfortable attacking from the left and fits Ole&#8217;s criteria for a fluid front three. He was actually part of the original fluid front three that Ole referred to with Rooney and Tevez.</p>
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<h2><strong>Will Ronaldo be on Penalties for Man United?</strong></h2>
<p>Last season, <strong>Manchester United were awarded 11 penalties</strong> in the league, scoring 10 of them. That&#8217;s a pretty decent record, with Bruno Fernandes proving to be an expert penalty taker.</p>
<p><strong>Ronaldo</strong> has scored 139 penalties in his career and has missed 27. That’s an 83.7% success rate. This isn’t in the elite category, but it&#8217;s still fairly good (especially when you consider the sheer volume he has taken). Despite the fact Fernandes deserves to retain his penalty taking duties, <strong>there&#8217;s a high probability Ronaldo will take United&#8217;s penalties anyway</strong>, judging by what happens with Portugal<b>. </b></p>
<p>His force of personality, combined with his hunger for goals, could be a key factor. The fact he and Fernandes are personal friends might also play into penalty taking negotiations.</p>
<p>The addition of <strong>Jadon Sancho</strong><strong> (£9.3m)</strong> could also lead to an increase in the number of penalties awarded to Manchester United.</p>
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<h2><strong>Ronaldo&#8217;s Aerial Threat</strong></h2>
<p>With <strong>Edinson Cavani (£8.5m)</strong> still not in contention for a starting berth, Man United&#8217;s aerial threat tends to come from their centre-backs. Namely, <strong>Harry Maguire (£5.5m)</strong>.</p>
<p>That could all change if Ronaldo joins, however, his propensity to &#8220;hover&#8221; in the air had lead to <strong>115 headed career goals. </strong>For context, <strong>Cavani has just 27.</strong></p>
<p>With the likes of Fernandes, Sancho, <strong>Paul Pogba (£7.7m)</strong> and <strong>Luke Shaw (£5.5m)</strong> providing plenty of crosses, Ronaldo could thrive in the air for Man United from open play and set pieces. It could also bode extremely well for his providers.</p>
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<h2><strong>How Will Manchester United Line-up With Ronaldo?</strong></h2>
<div id="attachment_38074" style="width: 1018px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-38074" class="wp-image-38074 size-full" src="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Screenshot-2021-08-27-at-15.08.03.png" alt="Man United with Ronaldo FPL" width="1008" height="1004" srcset="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Screenshot-2021-08-27-at-15.08.03.png 1008w, https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Screenshot-2021-08-27-at-15.08.03-300x300.png 300w, https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Screenshot-2021-08-27-at-15.08.03-150x150.png 150w, https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Screenshot-2021-08-27-at-15.08.03-768x765.png 768w, https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Screenshot-2021-08-27-at-15.08.03-610x608.png 610w" sizes="(max-width: 1008px) 100vw, 1008px" /><p id="caption-attachment-38074" class="wp-caption-text">Man United&#8217;s predicted line-up with Ronaldo</p></div>
<p>Despite his versatility, <strong>it&#8217;s highly likely Ronaldo will be utilised as a forward for Man United</strong>. In turn, that would almost certainly make him a <strong>forward in FPL</strong>.</p>
<p>His starting berth could well threaten <strong>Mason Greenwood</strong>&#8216;s, particularly if <strong>Sancho </strong>continues to develop. With that said, the young Englishman could still make an impact coming in from the left, or rotating on the right with Sancho if Solskjær prefers <strong>Anthony Martial (£7.8m)</strong> and when <strong>Rashford (£9.5m)</strong> eventually returns.</p>
<p>Luke Shaw and Bruno Fernandes look likely to benefit most. Their creativity is crying out for a clinical finisher, and Ronaldo certainly fits the bill.</p>
<p>If <strong>Pogba</strong> keeps up his brilliant assisting form, he could also find himself racking up the <strong>FPL points</strong> this season with <strong>Ronaldo as a target man</strong>.</p>
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<h2>Is Ronaldo a Good FPL Player?</h2>
<p>Yes, <strong>Ronaldo is definitely a good FPL player</strong>. It’s clear that <strong>Manchester United</strong> are a huge source of <strong>FPL points</strong> and that <strong>Ronaldo</strong> has the potential to be their talisman.</p>
<p>The hard part is, <strong>how do you fit him in?</strong> After all, there are four equally viable premium players in the game.</p>
<p><a href="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/fixture-ticker/"><strong>Manchester United&#8217;s fixtures </strong></a>remain sympathetic in the short-medium term, and one must assume that <strong>Ronaldo would be fairly immune to a tough fixture</strong> anyway. He&#8217;s shown he can perform against the very best teams on the biggest occasions.</p>
<p>This season is shaping up to be one of <strong>the most exciting we’ve had for years</strong>, with the title race likely to be close and lots of premium assets to choose from. To do well, I believe you’re going to have to try and jump on these players at the right time and ride their purple patches.</p>
<h2></h2>
<h2><strong>Does Ronaldo Destroy the FPL Template?</strong></h2>
<p>We’ve had it easy for the first two gameweeks. We could just focus on<strong> midfield premiums</strong> with the occasional <strong>Kane</strong> flirtation. Now we truly have <strong>five solid premium choices</strong> that we need to be willing to accommodate.</p>
<p>A shift towards a <strong>premium midfield and forward structure</strong> will provide the flexibility to switch between the players with the best fixtures. I’ve used the most expensive premium for each position in this example.</p>
<div id="attachment_38053" style="width: 612px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-38053" class="size-full wp-image-38053" src="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Draft-Squad.png" alt="" width="602" height="594" srcset="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Draft-Squad.png 602w, https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Draft-Squad-300x296.png 300w" sizes="(max-width: 602px) 100vw, 602px" /><p id="caption-attachment-38053" class="wp-caption-text">Potential Team Structure to Accommodate a Premium Midfielder and Forward</p></div>
<p>I think the <strong>introduction of Ronaldo</strong> would certainly force many FPL managers into an <strong>earlier Wildcard</strong> than otherwise planned.</p>
<p>The obvious swap would be to <strong>remove Bruno Fernandes to free up funds. </strong>That could spell the end of him as an FPL asset if you account for the fact that <strong>Ronaldo will take</strong> <strong>penalty duties at Man United</strong>.</p>
<p>In short: the FPL template is most certainly going to change, because <strong>Ronaldo would likely be a part of it</strong>. Throwing an expensive forward into a mix of pre-existing premium options should yield <strong>far more variety</strong> in our FPL line-ups.</p>
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<h2><b>Check out our Fantasy Premier League 2021/22 Ultimate Guide</b></h2>
<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Our </span><a href="https://cms.fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/fantasy-premier-league-ultimate-guide/"><b>Ultimate FPL 2021/22 Guide</b></a><span style="font-weight: 400;"> has everything you could ever need to be a successful FPL manager including guides, team previews, player picks, strategy articles, tools, stats, expert team reveals and much much more…</span></p>
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What will Cristiano Ronaldo (£12.5m) at Manchester United mean for FPL Managers? | Fantasy Premier League Tips 2021/22

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