Abundant Absurdity

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Abundant Absurdity

"I'm a slave". This is a quote from Cristiano Ronaldo made in July 2008. I say quote, I could replace that word with the word joke. Of course this can lead us to believe two things: either Ronaldo actually believes he is a slave or he doesn't realise the meaning of the word slave. Let’s go with the first option, he thinks that he is a slave. This footballer who earns £150,000 a week whether he plays or not, compares himself to people who are forced to work for little or no reward, people who are given no freedom and no rights. Cristiano Ronaldo is not a slave. The only footballer who has came close to being a slave in the last twenty years is Jean-Marc Bosman. Bosman was playing for RFC Liege in 1990 when his contract ended, he wanted to move to French team Dunkerque but RFC Liege felt they deserved money out of the deal and therefore would not allow him to go unless Dunkerque gave them money. Dunkerque didn't have the money and therefore RFC Liege dropped Bosman and reduced his wages to the minimum possible wage. Bosman then went to court and claimed $1,000,000 in damages. Anyway, the point is Bosman went to court because he knew he was being wronged. Ronaldo, on the other hand, is just looking for a way out of a very good contract in order to get an even bigger contract. This begs the question: What's more important club or contract?

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     In one corner we have the footballers who play for the badge: Gary Neville, Paolo Maldini and Humood Sultan, while in the other corner we have, to quote Gwen Stefani's song "What you waiting for?", the players focused on their "million dollar contract". The likes of Robinho(who surely was going to mega-rich Chelsea until super mega-rich Manchester City stepped in) and David Beckham(Can you imagine him as a kid saying "I really want to play for LA Galaxy when I'm older?). Now both these aforementioned players are very good and give their all for their countries but can ...

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