Lahoud: 'Ronaldo smoked too much shisha'
"Ronaldo smoked too much shisha," Lahoud told CBS Sports on July 18. "It's ridiculous to say that within a year the Saudi Pro League will surpass the Dutch and Turkish championships."
Regarding the comment that Saudi Pro League is better than MLS, the 37-year-old former midfielder affirmed that Ronaldo is still obsessed with Lionel Messi - who just joined Inter Miami in MLS. "As soon as Messi talks about bringing world football to North America's doorstep at the 2026 World Cup, this is what we see from Ronaldo," the former Chivas USD and Philadelphia Union player added.
Shisha is a grass originating from Arab, which directly affects the respiratory tract of the user causing a feeling of euphoria. Lahoud's simile is therefore aimed at attacking Ronaldo, claiming that the Portuguese striker is "hallucinating".
In the recent controversial interview, Ronaldo also announced that he would not return to Europe to play because most of the top national championships have gone down, except for the English Premier League. The 38-year-old star also insisted Serie A was "dead", before being revived by him by joining Juventus in 2018.
Lahoud denied this view, and advised Ronaldo to remember how he made Juventus become chaotic and not as classy as before.
Ronaldo has scored 145 goals for Man Utd, 450 goals for Real and 101 goals for Juventus. His massive collection includes 32 collective titles, including five Champions League, three Premier League, two La Liga and two Serie A. But since 2021, he has not enjoyed the joy of winning.
Because of disagreement, Ronaldo parted ways with Man Utd in November 2022. From the beginning of 2023, he started playing in the Saudi Pro League for Al Nassr club, receiving a salary of $ 200 million per year. Ronaldo scored 14 goals in 19 matches in the second half of the 2022-2023 season, but Al Nassr only finished second in the Saudi Pro League, besides stopping in the semi-finals of the Saudi Super Cup and the semi-finals of the King Cup.
However, the appearance of Ronaldo also makes an important contribution to helping the Saudi Pro League attract many stars from Europe this summer. Typically, Karim Benzema, N'Golo Kante, Kalidou Koulibaly, Ruben Neves, Sergey Milinkovic-Savic, Roberto Firmino or Edouard Mendy.
Al Hilal club approached Messi and made an offer of $ 400 million per year. But the Argentine striker refused, choosing to go to the US to play for Inter Miami.
According to Team Form, the MLS is currently ranked 56th in the list of world national championships. The Saudi Pro League ranks 68th, while the Turkish league ranks eighth and the Dutch league ranks 13th. The top seven positions currently belong to the English Premier League, La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga, Brazilian league, Ligue 1 and league. Portugal.
