Paim admitted to Portuguese media that he felt overwhelmed by the expectations placed on him as a professional footballer. During his career, several top European clubs wanted to sign him, including Manchester United, Barcelona and Real Madrid. These clubs often came to watch his matches.

However, the 36-year-old former attacking midfielder has fallen out of favour after a forgettable loan spell in the Premier League with Chelsea, where he made just a handful of appearances for the youth team. Despite this, Paim has caused a stir by comparing himself to two of the greatest footballers of all time, Cristiano Ronaldo and Messi.

Accordingly, Paim declared that he would be on par with both CR7 and Leo Messi in terms of career achievements if he had “half of Cristiano’s head”, while also making a notable comment about the Ballon d’Or award.

“I am truly special. I have to be humble but this is the truth. Unfortunately there was no Instagram or Facebook, nothing recorded like today but I firmly and honestly believe that until today there is no one like me with the same qualities as me.

Cristiano, with all his effort and hard work, has reached the level he deserves. But when I was playing, if I had the same effort and determination, I would have been better than him. Technically, I was better. I was the next Ronaldinho. But as we can see, it is not technical qualities that take us anywhere.

But it’s true that I was better than Cristiano at that time. I believe he should have given me one of his Ballons d’Or. Indeed, if I had half of Cristiano’s head, the Ballon d’Or race would not be him and Messi, but me, him and Messi. And of course he probably wouldn’t have won as many Ballons d’Or as he does now. Maybe one of them would have been mine.

Unfortunately for me, I was born with talent. When I made a lot of money, I had the illusion that I didn’t need to work hard. Someone like me cannot become a millionaire. I regret some of the choices I made. Now I’m at a different age so I can see the picture differently. The talent was there but the mind was not there. My mind was only thinking about women and parties, everything else but football,” Paim shared.

Before Paim’s statement, Ronaldo quickly commented on Paim’s statements on a very brief post on Instagram: “Oh, who is this guy?”. And this post immediately received many likes and comments expressing surprise like the 39-year-old Portuguese superstar.