Cristiano Ronaldo rejected an incentivised pay rise from Real Madrid (AS)

Cristiano Ronaldo rejected an incentivised pay rise from Real Madrid (AS)

Having turned one offer down five months ago, the Real Madrid forward had agreed to wait to the summer for talks over an improved contract.

Cristiano Ronaldo's remarks straight after Real Madrid's Champions League win in Kiev have surprised even his own camp, who say that the forward's words, which appeared to cast doubt over his future at the club, are just comments made in the heat of the moment.

Real and Cristiano had agreed to talk new deal in summer

In April, the LaLiga giants informed him of their intention to improve his contract and, in the process, fulfil the promise made by the club's president, Florentino Pérez, after the 2017 Champions League final in Cardiff. Before then, the 33-year-old had gone as far as to tell several of his team-mates that he would not be at Real next season, but after that initial contact between Los Blancos' general manager, José Ángel Sánchez, and the footballer's agent, Jorge Mendes, it seemed he had abandoned any thoughts of leaving the Bernabéu.

Sánchez and Mendes did not immediately discuss figures; rather, the aim was to give Cristiano peace of mind ahead of the business end of the season, with the player safe in the knowledge that his 22-million-euro pay packet would be increased to bring him within the same wage bracket as Neymar, whose Paris Saint-Germain deal nets him around 37 million euros a year after tax. Indeed, Cristiano's advisers let it be known that he felt positive about the moves made by the club to improve his contract. The plan was that talks would be resumed once Real Madrid's Champions League campaign was over. The former Manchester United man's post-match words on Saturday night were not in the script.

Origins of Cristiano tantrum in Pérez broken promise

Cristiano's outburst in the Ukrainian capital appears to go back to the promise of a pay rise that Pérez made to the player after beating Juventus at the Millennium Stadium 12 months ago, and which the Real chief would later row back on. During the Club World Cup in December, Sánchez held a meeting with Cristiano in which the club director sought to quell the star's grievances over the situation by offering him new, incentivised terms which included a nine-million-euro raise contingent on the team winning trophies (the Champions League, LaLiga...) and the player claming individual awards (the Ballon d'Or, Fifa's The Best Player prize...). The terms were rejected by Cristiano, who felt they showed no respect for what he has achieved at Real since joining in 2009.

To make matters worse, on the night of that month's Ballon d'Or gala in Paris - in which Cristiano was confirmed as winner of the accolade for the fifth time in his career - Pérez had publicly waxed lyrical about Neymar. He felt that the president's open flirtation with the Brazilian in the French capital had been appropriate. The bombshell dropped by the Portugal captain on Saturday were the latest twist in a situation that has been rumbling on for months.