World Cup 2022: Who will carry the global soccer torch after Cristiano Ronaldo?
By Martin Rogers
FOX Sports Columnist
Exactly one year from today, soccer’s grandest event will return, the World Cup, a sports occasion that captivates a global audience like none other — the Olympics included.
Has much happened in our world since the last one, four years ago? Yeah, just a little bit.
Back in the summer of 2018, when corona was known as just a beer, fist bumps were occasional and masks were for Halloween, Cristiano Ronaldo had himself a busy old time.
As the tournament began, the Portugal star paid more than $20 million to avoid prison in a Spanish tax fraud case related to his earnings while at Real Madrid. A couple of days later, he smashed home a spectacular hat trick to earn his team a dramatic 3-3 tie against Spain.
Before long, Ronaldo helped Portugal reach the round of 16 and reminded people why he was one of the all-time greats while strutting and preening enough to be described as the most arrogant yet brilliant athlete in sports (by, ahem, me).
Eventually, just as fans were starting to wonder whether he could finally do some damage in the elimination round of the most important competition in international soccer, the answer arrived — no, he couldn’t — as Portugal waved goodbye in the round of 16 stage with a defeat to Uruguay.
And, finally, he tried to upstage the final week of the World Cup (and somewhat succeeded) by announcing his move from Real Madrid to Juventus on the date of the semifinal.
None of this was especially surprising. Ronaldo is not only arguably the best soccer player of modern times, with Lionel Messi the only other participant in that conversation, but he is also the most fascinating. He’s aggravating to many, intoxicating to others, and unavoidably front and center of the soccer news cycle at any given time.
It is going to be the same story in the months of November and December next year, as Qatar readies to play host to 32 of the top teams in the world. Right?
Well, yes, unless the unthinkable, which suddenly took a seismic lurch toward "thinkable," transpires between now and then. Because Ronaldo, as things stand, might not be there.
The 36-year-old has often said this World Cup will be his last international tournament, but as Portugal stumbled at the final hurdle — actually, the final minute — of its European qualifying campaign, his participation a year from now was thrown into major doubt.
Last Sunday, Portugal needed only a tie to guarantee a spot among the elite field and were situated at 1-1 at home to Serbia in the 90th minute but then surrendered a goal to Aleksandar Mitrovic to throw everything into flux.
At the end of the game, Ronaldo sat on the turf and shook his head, tearful anguish on his face. He knew what it meant: Portugal can still qualify for the World Cup, but the path just became infinitely more difficult.
"Football has shown us time and time again that sometimes the most difficult paths are the ones that lead us to the most desired outcomes," Ronaldo wrote on his social media a day later. "Yesterday’s result was tough, but not tough enough to get us down. The goal of being in the 2022 World Cup is still very much alive and we know what we have to do to get there. No excuses. Portugal on the road to Qatar."
Portugal must now face a playoff journey that will be thrilling to watch but is not for the faint-hearted. A total of 12 European teams must be whittled down to three, meaning each contender must win a pair of win-or-go-home, single-elimination matchups. Opponents such as European champion Italy, Sweden and Russia populate the field of contenders.
Ronaldo has survived the playoff path before. In 2010, a pair of narrow 1-0 wins against Bosnia and Herzegovina were enough to squeak Portugal through. Four years later, Ronaldo scored all four goals in a 4-2 home-and-home nail-biter against Sweden. This time, with two rounds to get through, is tougher.
It is hard to imagine a World Cup without Ronaldo, especially for those who idolize him and even for those who don’t. While it is possible that the playoff path becomes part of the Ronaldo lore and plays into his flair for the dramatic, it also enhances the narrative that things aren’t playing out as he would've wanted in this late part of his career.
At the club level, his summer return to Manchester United after 12 years away has experienced some road blocks. United has slumped to sixth in the English Premier League, and Ronaldo has not had the kind of revolutionary impact on the team that many expected.
One way or another, it won’t be long before Ronaldo and Messi’s careers come to an end, leading us all to wonder who will carry the global soccer torch the way they have for a decade and more.
France’s Kylian Mbappe, Norway's Erling Haaland and Brazil’s Neymar are the front-runners, but the most realistic answer is "no one." An outcome where a player (or two) dominates the sport for 10-plus years isn’t normal, we’ve just been conditioned to think so because Ronaldo and Messi were so good, for so long. More probable is that a revolving collection of stars will share the load.
Part of what has kept Ronaldo at the top is that whenever he has been doubted, he has always found a way to bounce back.
"I’ve lost count of the number of times over the years when it looked like Ronaldo was on the decline," British broadcaster Aidan Magee told me. "Even now, with things falling off course at United, you feel like it’s just a matter of time before he finds a way to turn things around."
Don’t count against him doing so again, though the fear of him not being there in Qatar is a chilling one. If his bid to play a fifth World Cup ultimately fails, it will be a shock to the soccer universe. There will be more tears — and not just from him.
Martin Rogers is a columnist for FOX Sports and the author of the FOX Sports Insider Newsletter. You can subscribe to the newsletter here.
