Rio Ferdinand snubs ex-Manchester United star Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi in sporting GOAT debate

Rio Ferdinand didn't name either Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo when he was asked to name his four GOAT sporting athletes.

The GOAT debate (greatest of all time) has been the cause of many heated conversations, with Messi and Ronaldo usually at the forefront of the discussion.

Ferdinand played alongside the latter for six years at Old Trafford before his move to Real Madrid in 2009. As a former teammate, Ferdinand backed Ronaldo in the Erik ten Hag dispute until his explosive interview with Piers Morgan.

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“You can't sit here and defend that from Cristiano Ronaldo,” he said last year after the bombshell interview. “Deep down, and I know it for a fact, this has all been manufactured for one thing - and that's for him to leave the club.

“This love affair with Man United that Cristiano has had is over in my eyes. I don't feel there's any way back, I don't feel the club will take him back and I don't think that he wants to come back.

“This is all manufactured for that reason. Up until this interview, I would defend him and say the club have a big responsibility to communicate better.”

The World Cup took place a month after Ronaldo’s tell-all interview and Messi, in many people’s eyes, settled the GOAT debate once and for all. Helping Argentina win their third crown put the icing on the cake of an illustrious footballing career.

But that is still not enough for Ferdinand to rank Messi as an all-time sporting GOAT. When speaking to Sports Illustrated, the 44-year-old looked beyond the footballing world when choosing his top four.

“Muhammad Ali, Mike Tyson, Michael Jordan, Roger Federer,”