The world’s most successful footballers often reach the pinnacle of their career playing for the most illustrious teams in the world.
The glitz, the glamour, the fame and the fortune often come after humble beginnings, working day and night to become the best of the very best in the business.
But what if some of these superstars had taken an entirely different career path, one that involved their success being played out in reverse? Here's how seven might've worked out.
Cristiano Ronaldo
There was some real excitement coming out of the Juventus academy.
This young kid by the name of Cristiano Ronaldo scored 50 goals in just 15 games for the Under-16 side, and was rewarded with a first-team debut for Juventus at the age of 15 years and 279 days – a Serie A record. Unsurprisingly, there was plenty of interest in the young Portuguese forward.
As they always do whenever any young player is remotely impressive, Real Madrid stood up and forced their way into negotiations. They deposited a cool £80m into Juve’s bank account and brought the starlet over to the Santiago Bernabéu, where he scored a whopping 450 goals across seven trophy-filled seasons.
With winning in Spain becoming pretty monotonous, Ronaldo took the decision to swap Madrid for the red half of Manchester, but after a few electric campaigns which yielded two Premier League titles, he began to slow down. United could no longer justify his £500,000-a-week wages and took the decision to return him to his homeland with Sporting CP.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic
After leaving Sweden for Italy as a young child, striker Zlatan Ibrahimović made waves at AC Milan, steadying a once-great ship despite his young age. He submitted a surprise transfer request to force through a move to LA Galaxy, but when asked for his motive behind the shock move, he simply insisted that ‘only Zlatan can understand what Zlatan does’.
United couldn’t understand Ibrahimović’s desire to leave Europe so early in his career and threw a huge sum of money at the Swede to bring him to Old Trafford after just one year in MLS.
Unfortunately, their faith in Ibrahimović was misguided as his controversial press conferences and love of karate kicking everyone saw him sold to Paris Saint-Germain two years later.
On his quest to find somebody worthy of managing Zlatan, Ibrahimović hopped from club to club for the majority of his career, with Milan, Barcelona, Inter, Juventus and Ajax all trying and failing.
Ibrahimović eventually became tired of the human race and retired to hometown side Malmö.
Mohamed Salah
An impressive season in Egyptian youth football earned Mohamed Salah a switch to Liverpool’s academy, but it always seemed doomed from the start as Liverpool’s record of bringing youth through at Stamford Br- I mean Anfield, is infamously poor. He was offloaded after just a few years, with Roma and Fiorentina offering him lifelines.
It was with Fiorentina that Salah really showcased his skills, convincing Chelsea to splash the cash and bring him back to England. The Blues know all about talent and could never make such a grave mistake like Liverpool.
Forming a devastating trio alongside Romelu Lukaku and Kevin De Bruyne, Salah spent ten years in London, winning title after title before being released after Chelsea realised they were scared of anything over 30 years old. A tame spell with Basel, followed and Salah is now the player/manager of Egyptian side Al Mokawloon.
Gareth Bale
Little is known about Gareth Bale’s introduction to football, but the most common story is that he got lost on the way to a golf course and ended up at the Bernabéu, where Real Madrid managed to tempt him to sign a professional contract with the promise that he could go play golf whenever he wanted. He was that good.
Given the freedom to relax on his own terms, away from the media, Bale quickly became one of the world’s best players in Spain. His speed and strength made him a nightmare for any defender, and his penchant for a worldie goal turned him into a fan favourite in Madrid. Fans petitioned for a statue of Bale to be built outside the Bernabéu, and after 500,000 signatures, their wish was granted.
Because of his years of loyal service, Bale was permitted to return closer to home and sign for Tottenham Hotspur, who he helped qualify for the Champions League for the first time in their history.
His next move, a free transfer to Southampton, didn’t yield the same success. The Saints quickly grew tired of Bale replacing every second word in a sentence with ‘golf’ and banished him to the bench for the remainder of his career.
Radamel Falcao
Turkish football had never seen anything quite like Radamel Falcao, who made his debut for Galatasaray when he was just 13 years old. 13. It’s no surprise that French moneybags Monaco did all they could to land his signature, and after three ludicrously prolific seasons, every team in the world wanted him.
It was Chelsea who won the race and brought Falcao in on loan with a view to a permanent move, and it looked like the Blues had struck gold, only for a transfer ban to prevent them from signing Falcao permanently.
Manchester United tried to capitalise with a loan move of their own, but a bumper new contract at Monaco saw Falcao snub the chance to move to Old Trafford permanently. However, after just one year, the emergence of a certain Kylian Mbappé forced Falcao to look elsewhere.
Atlético Madrid lured him over to Spain and won three consecutive Champions Leagues with the Colombian in attack. Falcao was on another level, but a serious knee injury slowed him down for good. Spells with Porto, River Plate and Lanceros Boyacá followed, but he was never the same again.
Luis Suárez
Barcelona’s famous La Masia academy knows all about producing top young talent, and Uruguayan forward Luis Suárez was exactly that. He had his fair share of disciplinary issues, but his ridiculous goals tally and ability to lead Barcelona to five La Liga titles made him worth it.
After clashing with the club’s dentist, Suárez requested a transfer to Liverpool, where the good times kept on rolling. Forming a prolific duo with Andy Carroll, Suárez won another three league titles in England and soon decided that he had nothing left to prove.
Despite still being relatively young, Suárez left the English top flight in favour of winning four Eredivisie titles with Ajax, but he finally failed went a season without a title after his decision to join Groningen. Clearly devastated, he returned to Uruguay with Nacional.
Mats Hummels
Mats Hummels’ career can be summed up with one word: indecision.
The centre-back broke through at Borussia Dortmund and blossomed into a starter for the German international team, where he met plenty of players from rivals Bayern Munich, who had won the Bundesliga title for the last 10,000 years. His head was turned and he jetted off to Munich.
With his transfer fee, Dortmund rebuilt and somehow managed to snatch the crown away from Bayern, which prompted Hummels to push for a return ‘home’. He got his wish, but he failed to get his hands on the title during any of the seven seasons he was there. Bayern were back on top.
With age catching up to him, Hummels forced through another move to Bayern, but yet again, he was left with no silverware to raise as RB Leipzig had now propelled their way to the top of the food chain in Germany.
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Source : 90min