Ronaldo: "I'll go down in history, the numbers speak for themselves"

Cristiano Ronaldo has again shown no lack in confidence, claiming he is sure he will be remembered as one of the best ever football players.

Ronaldo has smashed almost every record there is when it comes to goalscoring, so I guess we can excuse his arrogance.

The player admits he will never please everyone, but he is sure that his statistics prove he is one of the best ever players the world has seen.

"I don't doubt that I will go down in footballing history," he told UEFA.com ahead of his teams semi-final second leg with Manchester City on Wednesday. 

"Whether people like it or not, the numbers speak for themselves. I will be up there with the rest. Some like it more, some like it less, but I have no doubt that I'm already in the history of football."

Ronaldo went on to say he never doubted in his abilities, but he didn't expect to rise to the top quite so quickly.

"I always felt that I was a special player, ever since I was starting out at Sporting," he added. "I felt that sooner or later I would be a top-level professional. I never thought it would come so fast, but I was preparing myself because, like I said, the talent was there.

"I've always worked hard, believed in my potential – in the academy at Sporting, at Manchester United and at Real Madrid as well – and I've developed more and more as a player, as a person, as a human being. I've enjoyed my work.

"Fans always like to see a good match, and to see goals obviously. And that's my job. It's to win, play well, score as many goals as possible, help my team and enjoy it. 'Enjoy' is the word that I need to underline, because that's football: it's happiness, it's passion and it's adversity as well."

He finished by saying he never had a footballing 'idol' growing up, but that he looked up to some of Portugal's top players.

"To be honest, I never looked at any player and wanted to be like them; some great players who have passed through Sporting but I was always thinking further ahead," he added. 

"I was already thinking about the national team. I felt that playing for a big club was difficult but I was going to be able to do it, but playing for the national team is always more difficult. And then things happened very quickly.

"I signed for Manchester United, and after some time I was in the national team. My big reference points were Fernando Couto, Rui Costa and Luis Figo, because they were the biggest names in Portuguese football."