In spite of their other concerns, Inter Milan yesterday moved quickly to play down comments from Ronaldo at the weekend which implied that he will have serious injury-related problems for the rest of his career. Speaking to local TV station, Telelombardia, the world's number one footballer had indicated that he was suffering from a "chronic" problem in both knees, a problem that might in future force him to pick and choose his matches.
"I have a chronic injury problem. The fans ought to know that I'm not the player of last year and that I can't play in all our games," Ronaldo told viewers.
Asked if he expected to recover in time for Thursday's Italian Cup quarter-final tie away to Lazio, he answered: "I don't know if I'll be playing, I hope so. Right now we've got to draw up a programme and make some choices so that I play in all the important games".
By yesterday afternoon, anyone who chose to consult Inter's offical web site (www.inter.it) could read a note from club spokesman Sandro Sabatini explaining that in reality nothing had changed concerning Ronaldo's medical situation and that his comments had been misunderstood largely because of a linguistic problem.
Sabatini points out that when Ronaldo used the expression chronic injury - lesione cronica in Italian - he had meant only that the injury was of long standing, but not that it was either irreversible or incurable. After a two-hour swimming pool session with his Brazilian physiotherapist, Nilton Petroni, Ronaldo attempted to set the record straight regarding his knee problems: "All I wanted to say was that my knee problems have gone on for a long time, but that now I'm better and continuing to improve," he said.
"I'm sorry to have caused such confusion when in reality the situation has not changed much from the last few days when welcome progress allowed me play against Real Madrid. However, it's only fair that the fans should know that just at the moment I cannot guarantee to be able to play in all our forthcoming games".
Recurrent tendon problems in both knees plagued Ronaldo during the World Cup in France and have forced him to miss 13 of Inter Milan's 22 Serie A, Champions' League and Italian Cup games so far this season. The Brazilian came back into the side for last Wednesday's vital 3-1 Champions' League win against Real Madrid but aggravated his knee problems in that match, thus forcing him out of Inter's 2-1 home win against Salernitana on Sunday.
Sunday's statement notwithstanding, yesterday's clarification from both the club and player will have fuelled speculation that Ronaldo's problems could be long-term. Even the Inter club doctor, Piero Volpi, referred to Ronaldo's problems as chronic when explaining the reason for his "precautionary" withdrawal from last Saturday's match.
"We're dealing with a chronic injury case here, one unfortunately aggravated both by a heavy workload and by knocks and stress (during a match), it's a very difficult and subtle type of case history . . . If he keeps on playing, the problem remains, therefore it has to be dealt with both in his training and his match schedules. There's no mystery about it and no alarm either," said Volpi.
"Ronaldo may be able to play 10 games in a row, or one game in 10 or play in every second game. It all depends on the pain. If he has no pain, he plays, if he's in pain, he doesn't play. We can't make predictions, we just have to assess things day by day," he added.
Speculation about Ronaldo's fitness was inevitably and originally fuelled by the dramatic events immediately before last July's World Cup final. On that occasion, Ronaldo appeared to suffer some kind of fit or seizure in his hotel room on the afternoon of the final and it was only at the last minute that he was selected to play in the Brazil team which disappointed in a 3-0 defeat by France.
Both Inter Milan owner, Massimo Moratti, and club doctor Volpi have since expressed their concern about the manner in which the Brazilian team staff handled Ronaldo throughout the World Cup, implying that he played despite feeling pain in both knees.
In the meantime, Inter are leaving nothing to chance in an effort to protect their $100 million-plus investment in Ronaldo. Not only have the club arranged for Ronaldo's Brazilian physiotherapist Petroni to oversee his training for the last week but they have also laid out a 30-metre long strip of sand so that Ronaldo can follow the part of his physio's programme which calls for him to run barefoot in sand, pulling against elastic holders. It may not be the Copacabana but Inter clearly hope it will help their ailing star.
