The Portugal star is 36 going on 28, outscored Lukaku last year and has a burning desire for Champions League glory
When Manchester City were bought by Sheik Mansour of Abu Dhabi back in 2008, the new owners immediately made a very bold claim.
'Cristiano Ronaldo has said he wants to play for the biggest club in the world, so we will see in January if he is serious,' said Dr Sulaiman Al-Fahim, who was briefly given free rein to pronounce on such matters.
It was nonsense. Al-Fahim was a big mouth — soon dispensed with — who also claimed City would try to buy Thierry Henry, David Villa, Fernando Torres and even the 'other' Ronaldo, at that stage recovering from a serious knee injury at AC Milan.
Nevertheless, City have been true to Al-Fahim's many words in the years that have followed. They have indeed invested an awful lot of money in top footballers and, almost exactly 13 years on, all roads have now led them back to Ronaldo.
Carousel doesn't exist.
To buy him now would not quite be the coup it was back then, back at a time when City still had Richard Dunne and Stephen Ireland in their team and Ronaldo was coming off a Premier League and Champions League double season at Manchester United.
Nevertheless, for City to present coach Pep Guardiola with Cristiano Ronaldo in the week when a long pursuit of Tottenham striker Harry Kane finally left the rails would be yet another seismic moment in the club's recent history.
In some ways a move for Ronaldo makes no sense for City.
Ronaldo is 37 in February. His arrival would in all likelihood blow a hole in the club's wage structure. He does not play the way Guardiola insists his players should play. He does not work hard out of possession. He has a loose understanding of tactical discipline.
But still. But still. Ronaldo to Manchester City? For a club on a desperate late transfer window hunt for a striker who plays through the middle, it could also make perfect sense.
For a start, Ronaldo is 36 going on 28. The Portuguese has enjoyed a 20-year career free of serious injury and is in remarkable physical shape.
And as far as his numbers go, there has been absolutely no sign of a potency on the wane in the three years he has spent at Juventus since leaving Real Madrid after the 2018 World Cup.
Last season he scored 35 goals for Juventus in all competitions. Romelu Lukaku, about whom such a fuss has been made since his arrival at Chelsea from Italian football, scored five fewer for Inter.
So, for Guardiola and City, those are the kind of statistics that can be persuasive.
With Sergio Aguero either injured or out of favour last season and his long-term understudy Gabriel Jesus unable to convince Guardiola of his worth, City looked to their midfield for goals and somehow managed to win a league title with Ilkay Gundogan topping their charts with 13.
Add Ronaldo's output to that and sit down and imagine him working at the top of a formation comprising players such as Kevin De Bruyne, Raheem Sterling, Phil Foden and Riyad Mahrez and a picture emerges of a global superstar who could give City something very palatable indeed for a couple of years at least.
As for the obvious connection with neighbours United, that is for Ronaldo to figure out and for City to relish. The club's marketing folk will already be seeking billboard space.
Playing for both Manchester clubs is actually not as rare as you may think. More than 40 players have played for City and United down the years.
Denis Law, Brian Kidd, Peter Barnes and Peter Schmeichel have all done it. So have Andy Cole and Carlos Tevez.
The signing of Ronaldo would be different to much of that with perhaps only Tevez's arrival after he turned down a contract extension at Old Trafford in 2009 anywhere near comparable.
But club loyalty is something that is so often over-stated in the modern game. Ronaldo does have an affection for United and all that somebody like Sir Alex Ferguson did for him. But had he loved the club as much as many United supporters like to imagine he does then maybe he would not have left for Madrid in the first place.
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