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Cristiano Ronaldo is speaking out.
The soccer superstar addressed his recent abrupt exit from training camp with Portugal’s national team, accusing head coach Jorge Jesus of a “breach of trust” in a massive, 1,740-word statement.
“I decided to leave the camp without waiting for any further broken promise,” Ronaldo wrote on Instagram Oct. 6. “For me, the truth is still the most important thing in the relationship between people. No matter how much it may hurt, tell me the truth.”
The 41-year-old said it all began after Jesus, 72, succeeded Roberto MartĂnez as head coach in July. Upon their first meeting to discuss the team’s games against Wales, Norway and Denmark, Ronaldo said Jesus “submitted the idea that I not travel with the squad to Norway and Denmark.”
“He proposed that I play the first game, stay in Portugal, and then rejoin the team before the match at the DragĂŁo,” the athlete wrote in his statement. “I refused this proposal immediately. It seemed obvious to me that I could not accept it. Even though I wouldnât be playing the matches abroad I was still captain of our team. That privilege of staying in Portugal would not set a good example.”
Ronaldo said Jesus later relented and asked him on the day of their Sept. 27 game against Norway if he could play for 30 minutes.
“I was totally focused on my physical recovery, integrated with my teammates as always, and thinking I would not play that day,” Ronaldo recalled, “but I obviously said yes. He replied that I should be ready, because I would play 30 minutes.”
“I warmed up from halftime, watched the minutes go by, and was never called on,” he continued. “The Head Coach had failed to keep his word.”
Ronaldo said he approached Jesus two days after the match for a “very frank” conversation, during which the two agreed that the coach would hold a press conference to explain what had happened at the Norway game.
“He would say that I never asked to play any minutes,” Ronaldo wrote, “that it was the Head Coach and no one else who proposed the plan for this camp to me, and that it was a mistake to have me warm up and then not bring me on.”
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However, when the conference was held on Sept. 30, the two-time Nations League winner said Jesus spoke with “an aggressiveness I believe I did not deserve, a ‘High and mighty’ attitude that he never showed me, not even remotely, in private the day before.”
Seeing how it was “the second time he was failing to keep his word to me,” Ronaldo said he decided to leave training camp early, emphasizing that he did not “interfere in any technical or tactical decision” by doing so.
“I also owe an apology to my National Team teammates for having left the camp,” he added. “I apologize to the Portuguese people once again, but the breaking of oneâs word has, for me, a defining impact. I felt that, from that point on, my staying would only harm the group, and I did what I have always said I would do if I did not feel useful: I picked up my bags and left.”
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But this doesnât mean Ronaldo is retiring just yet. As he put it, âI can promise all my fans, naturally and especially all Portuguese people, that we will have one or more farewell matches; there will be time for that.â
Ronaldo added, “So, if I am physically well, playing for my club, hopefully with goals, after serving whatever suspension is imposed on me, I will be available, as I have always been until today, to compete and win for our National Team.”
E! News has reached out to the Portuguese Football Federation and the Sports Confederation of Portugal for comment but hasnât heard back. Jesus previously denied there was a rift between himself and Ronaldo, telling reporters Sept. 30, âDon’t try to make a fuss where there isn’t one.â
âIt was a coach’s decision,â he added of Ronaldoâs absence at training camp, per USA Today. âI had a plan.”
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