Cristiano Ronaldo ‘could leave Real Madrid this month’

Cristiano Ronaldo ‘could leave Real Madrid’ this month’. We’re really suffering here - how incredibly depressing that we’ll have to do this dance every single year until he retires. Either sign a new contract or don’t. Either leave, or don’t. Real Madrid don’t need to balance the books, and United probably would do better to keep their powder dry for Antoine Griezmann, Gareth Bale, or whoever is available next summer.

Gary Neville has a new monument to gaudy wealth to hawk about. Why not take a look at photos of the flat to find out what they look like? Yes, life really is that interesting, and it is ending one second at a time.

Here’s Juan Mata doing what you’d expect, and wearing a retro Manchester United top in what I assume is an advert for adidas. I’d love to be able to click on the link and spend some of my time confirming that, but my hands remain tied. Sorry, not my choice.

The Carabao Cup second round played out last night. There wasn’t especially notable, and the big cup specialist, Rafael Benitez has been unable to negotiate a tie with Nottingham Forest. The third round was drawn last night, and they will take on Burton Albion.

ESPN have a huge interview with Paul Pogba, where he talks about racism, Nemanja Matic, Romelu Lukaku and United’s title rivals. If you have nothing to do with your day, I congratulate you, but you could spend some of the time watching it here.

The Champions League draw is this morning. The Independent has run through the worst possible opponents for United, and you can read that here. Here, though, are my suggestions for the worst possible opponents that the club could come up with: Goldman Sachs, the cast of The Expendables, and the untapped reserve of shame that is building up in us all.