Cristiano Ronaldo: Man Utd icon’s stunning collection of goals he almost scored

Even at the age of 37, the five-time Ballon d’Or winner managed to notch 24 goals in all competitions for Manchester United last season, making him the club’s top scorer for the campaign.

By the standards of his prime, though, that scoring ratio was positively pedestrian from the Portuguese legend.

In total, Ronaldo has found the back of the net on a staggering 816 occasions in 1,133 senior outings for club and country.For the sake of clarity, 145 of those goals came from the penalty spot.

However, Ronaldo’s back catalogue also includes all manner of sensational finishes.

His vast collection of wonder goals includes gravity-defying headers, long-range thunderbolts and exquisite free-kicks.

As outrageous as some of the goals he has scored over the years have been, Ronaldo has been inches away from adding some absolute wordies to his tally.

Of course, the ‘near miss’ is something that all strikers are used to. With that said, a compilation of Ronaldo’s greatest strikes that almost found the net has re-emerged on Twitter and the confidence and venom with which he hits the ball is something to behold.

You can check out the video in question below. We really were tantalisingly close to some truly astonishing goals.

There were no such robberies here – just a full minute of Ronaldo relentlessly peppering the target with some of the purest strikes you’ll ever see.

In most cases, the goalkeepers involved are reduced to mere spectators as they watch the ball crash into the woodwork before letting out a sigh of relief.

Ronaldo’s 816 career goals currently mean that he has scored on 39 more occasions than his eternal rival, Lionel Messi (777 goals).

With the Argentine superstar being a couple of years younger than Ronaldo (and playing first-team football more regularly at present), those bangers that never were might prove a major factor in the GOAT debate between the pair at the end of their careers.