Future belongs at the feet of the boy form Brazil

HE likes to eat American style hamburgers, especially at Planet Hollywood. He watches lots of TV, beamed in on two satellite dishes on his hilltop house, complete with view of the sea. If he wants to dress up, he wears Armani slacks and sweaters, rarely jackets.

He has his own Internet site. His current 10 year contract with sports wear giant NIKE is reported to be worth millions, bringing his estimated annual earnings to a conservative $4 million.

Yet another poor boymade good thanks to soccer, he has already bought each of his separated parents a house. He drives a BMW and keeps a German Shepherd.

His blonde 19 year old girlfriend, Susan, works as a model, mainly in his faraway native Brazil and they keep their relationship alive through long transatlantic phone calls. He has the face of a child and the bank account of a millionaire.

At 21 years, he has become, arguably, the most scrutinised and talked about footballer in the world, known by understated nicknames such as "The Phenomenon", "The Best", "New Pele", "The New Maradona", "The Extraterrestrial" etc.

He is, of course, Luiz Nazario de Lima, otherwise known as Ronaldo, star of Barcelona present and Brazil future. Just in case you might have been tempted to forget about the 1996 FIFA World Player, Ronaldo reminded everyone of his explosive potential with a hat trick for Barcelona in a remarkable 5-4 Spanish Cup quarter final, second leg, win against reigning Spanish champions, Atletico Madrid, last week at the Nou Camp.

Barcelona's win in that cup tie was the stuff of legend. Behind 3-0 at half time, the Catalan side took advantage of Atletico's momentary second half block to storm back, hitting five goals, with the Portuguese striker Figo and Spanish international Pizzi also getting on the score sheet.

That remarkable fightback by Barcelona, of course, was not entirely due to Ronaldo. Indeed, a neutral observer, such as the Ajax Amsterdam coach Luis Van Gaal, was probably right when he picked out the Bulgarian, Hristo Stoichkov, a second half substitute, as the real architect of the Barcelona recovery.

Nonetheless, a truly dramatic night at the Nou Camp only served to fuel the Ronaldo myth. Within hours of that win, sports pages worldwide were speculating that Ronaldo was once more for sale and at a price of $30 million, plus a 10 year contract worth an annual $3.75 million.

One Italian daily, Il Tempo, even "confirmed" that reigning European champions and current Italian league leaders, Juventus, had already agreed to buy Ronaldo, more or less at the above terms.

Italian sports dailies speculated that a side like AC Milan might consider selling Croat Zvonimir Boban, Liberian George Weah, Montenegrin Dejan Savicevic and Italian Roberto Baggio, all to raise the cash to underwrite the purchase of Ronaldo.

Even though Ronaldo says he has no intention of leaving Barcelona - the club he joined this summer from Dutch side PSV Eindhoven for approximately $20 million - the speculation is sure to run and run from now until the end of the Spanish season, when the Brazilian and Barcelona are due to discuss a new contract.

The point about Ronaldo is that his performances this season have been so explosive as to enable his team of agents (two Brazilians and an Italian) to up the odds on the Catalan club.

When Barcelona bought the player last summer on a six year contract worth an annual $1.8 million, it seemed like a fabulous deal - even if the player in question had been one of the most talked about in European soccer for some time. (Ronaldo moved from Cruzeiro to Eindhoven in the summer, of 1994, following his participation as a non playing substitute in Brazil's 1994 World Cup win Brazilian coach Carlos Alberto Parreira wisely considered him too inexperienced and left him on the bench).

It seems Barcelona have come up with an offer of an eight year contract, through to 2006, at an annual salary of $3.75 million and with an obligatory "buy out" clause that puts his value at a staggering $62.5 million. Ronaldo's agents are thinking about it.

Meanwhile, French club Paris St Germain, German club Bayern Munich, English sides Manchester United and Arsenal, Spanish side Real Madrid and Italian teams AC Milan, Parma and Juventus are all believed to have made mild enquiries over the last five months.

What does the player say to all of this? In a rare interview with Italian sports weekly, Guernin Sportivo, last week, he said: "My contract here (Barcelona) runs out in 2004. All the great players in soccer history have linked their name to one club or, at most, two clubs and I want to link mine to Barcelona."

Asked how it left to be continually referred to as the "best player in the world", Ronaldo says simply: "I don't consider myself the best in the world, maybe the most talked about though ... People are always comparing me with ... but in general I don't like comparisons with the past. Pele belongs to another era, to an entirely different soccer.

The past may belong to Pele. The future belongs to Ronaldo.