The 23-year-old Portuguese crashed into a barrier in a tunnel on the A538 Wilmslow Road which takes traffic under the runways of Manchester Airport between Wilmslow and Hale at around 10.20am.

Ronaldo, who featured as substitute in United in the 1-0 League Cup semi-final defeat at Derby County on Wednesday evening, was able to get out of the vehicle himself and was spoken to by police at the scene.

Earlier this week Ronaldo was named as the 11th richest player linked to British football, with the write-off of the F599, which has a starting list price of £190,000, basically it is only about 1.5x of his weekly wage which will not be a lasting financial blow.

Ronaldo later arrived at the club’s Carrington training ground near Sale and took part in the morning’s session.

Manchester United confirmed the Ballon d’Or winner was unhurt, saying: “He was involved in an incident this morning. No other cars were involved. He’s fine and is training as normal with the team.”

His team-mate, goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar, was reported to have been travelling behind Ronaldo at the time of the crash.

The Ferrari was later loaded on to a recovery truck, covered in a black sheet, as the road was reopened.