Cristiano Ronaldo
Cristiano Ronaldo dos Santos Aveiro GOIH ComM (Portuguese pronunciation: [kɾiʃˈtjɐnu ʁɔˈnaldu]; born 5 February 1985) is a Portuguese professional footballer who plays as a forward for and captains both Saudi Pro League club Al Nassr and the Portugal national team. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Ronaldo has won five Ballon d'Or awards,[note 3] a record three UEFA Men's Player of the Year Awards, and four European Golden Shoes, the most by a European player. He has won 33 trophies in his career, including seven league titles, five UEFA Champions Leagues, the UEFA European Championship and the UEFA Nations League. Ronaldo holds the records for most appearances (183), goals (140) and assists (42) in the Champions League, goals in the European Championship (14), international goals (128) and international appearances (206). He is one of the few players to have made over 1,200 professional career appearances, the most by an outfield player, and has scored over 880 official senior career goals for club and country, making him the top goalscorer of all time.
"CR7" redirects here. For other uses, see CR7 (disambiguation), Cristiano Ronaldo (disambiguation), Cristiano (disambiguation), and Ronaldo (disambiguation).
Ronaldo began his senior career with Sporting CP, before signing with Manchester United in 2003, winning the FA Cup in his first season. He would also go on to win three consecutive Premier League titles, the Champions League and the FIFA Club World Cup; at age 23, he won his first Ballon d'Or. Ronaldo was the subject of the then-most expensive association football transfer when he signed for Real Madrid in 2009 in a transfer worth €94 million (£80 million). He became a key contributor and formed an attacking trio with Karim Benzema and Gareth Bale which was integral to the team winning four Champions Leagues from 2014 to 2018, including La Décima. During this period, he won back-to-back Ballons d'Or in 2013 and 2014, and again in 2016 and 2017, and was runner-up three times behind Lionel Messi, his perceived career rival. He also became the club's all-time top goalscorer and the all-time top scorer in the Champions League, and finished as the competition's top scorer for six consecutive seasons between 2012 and 2018. With Real, Ronaldo won four Champions Leagues, two La Liga titles, two Copas del Rey, two UEFA Super Cups and three Club World Cups. In 2018, he signed for Juventus in a transfer worth an initial €100 million (£88 million), the most expensive transfer for an Italian club and for a player over 30 years old. He won two Serie A titles, two Supercoppa Italiana trophies and a Coppa Italia, became the inaugural Serie A Most Valuable Player and became the first footballer to finish as top scorer in the English, Spanish and Italian leagues. He returned to Manchester United in 2021, finishing his only full season as the club's top scorer, before his contract was terminated in 2022. In 2023, he signed for Al Nassr.
Ronaldo made his international debut for Portugal in 2003 at the age of 18 and has since earned more than 200 caps, making him both the country and history's most-capped player of all time, recognised by the Guinness World Records.[10] With more than 100 goals at international level, he is also the sports all-time top goalscorer. Ronaldo has played in and scored at eleven major tournaments; he scored his first international goal at Euro 2004, where he helped Portugal reach the final. He assumed captaincy of the national team in July 2008. In 2015, Ronaldo was named the best Portuguese player of all time by the Portuguese Football Federation. The following year, he led Portugal to their first major tournament title at Euro 2016, and received the Silver Boot as the second-highest goalscorer of the tournament. This achievement would see him receive his fourth Ballon d'Or. He also led them to victory in the inaugural UEFA Nations League in 2019, receiving the top scorer award in the finals, and later received the Golden Boot as top scorer of Euro 2020.
One of the world's most marketable and famous athletes, Ronaldo was ranked the world's highest-paid athlete by Forbes in 2016, 2017, and 2023, and the world's most famous athlete by ESPN from 2016 to 2019. Time included him on their list of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2014. He is the first footballer and the third sportsman to earn US$1 billion in his career.
Early life
Cristiano Ronaldo dos Santos Aveiro was born on 5 February 1985 in the São Pedro parish of Funchal, the capital of the Portuguese island of Madeira, and grew up in the nearby parish of Santo António.[11][12] He is the fourth and youngest child of Maria Dolores dos Santos Viveiros da Aveiro, who worked as a cook in the hospitality industry and a cleaning woman,[13][14] and José Dinis Aveiro, a municipal gardener at the Junta de Freguesia of Santo António and part-time kit man for football club Andorinha.[15][16][17] His great-grandmother on his father's side, Isabel da Piedade, an African woman, was born in the island of São Vicente, in what was then Portuguese Cape Verde, and moved to Madeira Island at 16.[18][19] He has one older brother, Hugo, and two older sisters, Elma and Liliana Cátia "Katia".[20] He was named after actor and U.S. President Ronald Reagan, whom his father was a fan of.[21] His mother revealed that she wanted to abort him due to poverty, his father's alcoholism, and having too many children already, but her doctor refused to perform the procedure,[22][23] as abortions were illegal in Portugal at that time.[24] Ronaldo grew up in an impoverished Roman Catholic home, sharing a room with all his siblings.[25]
As a child, Ronaldo played for Andorinha from 1992 to 1995,[26] where his father was the kit man,[15] and later spent two years with Nacional. In 1997, aged 12, he went on a three-day trial with Sporting CP, who signed him for a fee of £1,500.[27] He subsequently moved from Madeira to Lisbon to join Sporting CP's youth system.[27] By age 14, while struggling with his school duties and responsibilities in Escola EB2 de Telheiras, his school in the Telheiras area of Lisbon, Ronaldo believed he had the ability to play semi-professionally and agreed with his mother and his tutor at Sporting CP, Leonel Pontes,[28] to cease his education to focus entirely on football.[29][30] With a troubled life as a student[31] and although living in Lisbon area away from his Madeiran family,[32][33] he did not complete schooling beyond the 6th grade.[34][35] While popular with other students at school, he had been expelled after throwing a chair at his teacher, who he said had "disrespected" him.[29] One year later, he was diagnosed with tachycardia, a condition that could have forced him to give up playing football.[36] Ronaldo underwent heart surgery where a laser was used to cauterise multiple cardiac pathways into one, altering his resting heart rate.[37] He was discharged from the hospital hours after the procedure and resumed training a few days later.[38] In 2021, Cristiano Ronaldo's mother, Dolores Aveiro, stated in an interview for Sporting CP's official television channel (Sporting TV) that her son would be a bricklayer if he hadn't become a professional football player.[39]
Player profile
Style of play
A versatile attacker, Ronaldo is capable of playing on either wing as well as through the centre of the pitch,[495] and, while ostensibly right-footed, is very strong with both feet.[496] Tactically, Ronaldo has undergone several evolutions throughout his career. While at Sporting and during his first season at Manchester United, he was typically deployed as a traditional winger on the right side of midfield, where he regularly looked to deliver crosses into the penalty area. In this position, he was able to use his pace and acceleration, agility and technical skills to take on opponents in one-on-one situations. Ronaldo became noted for his dribbling and flair, often displaying an array of tricks and feints,[497][498] such as the step overs and so-called 'chops' that became his trademark;[499] he has also been known to use the flip-flap.[500]
Personal life
Family, children, and relationships
Ronaldo has five living children. He first became a father to a son, who was born on 17 June 2010 in the United States.[639] He has full custody of the child and has not publicly revealed the identity of the mother per an agreement with her.[640][641] In January 2015, Ronaldo's five-year relationship with Russian model Irina Shayk ended.[642]
Ronaldo became a father to twins,[643] born on 8 June 2017 in the United States via surrogacy. He is currently in a relationship with Argentine-born Spanish model Georgina Rodríguez,[644] who gave birth to a daughter on 12 November 2017.[645] The couple expected a pair of twins in 2022. The male twin died during childbirth while the female twin survived.[646]
Ronaldo's father, José, died of an alcoholism-related liver condition at age 52 in September 2005 when Ronaldo was 20.[647]
In January 2023, after Ronaldo moved to Saudi Arabia with his family having been signed by Saudi Pro League side Al Nassr, the rulers of the Muslim-leaning Kingdom made Ronaldo an exception to the rule that unmarried couples are not allowed to live together in Saudi Arabia. An unnamed Saudi lawyer told Spanish news agency EFE that "the laws of the Kingdom still prohibit cohabitation without a marriage contract", but Saudi authorities have begun to "turn a blind eye and stop prosecuting anyone, even though these laws are applied when there is a problem or a crime".[648]
Ronaldo is of (one eighth) Cape Verdean descent through his great-grandmother.[649] He is a Roman Catholic.[650]
Health
Ronaldo has said that he does not drink alcohol,[630] and he received libel damages over a Daily Mirror article that reported him drinking heavily in a nightclub while recovering from an injury in July 2008.[651] He also does not have any tattoos as he regularly donates blood and bone marrow.[652]
Legal issues
In July 2017, Ronaldo was charged with fraudulently evading almost €15 million in tax between 2011 and 2014, a claim he denied at the time.[653] In June 2018, Ronaldo was given a two-year suspended jail sentence and fined €18.8 million, later reduced to €16.8 million after reaching a deal with Spanish authorities. The sentence can be served under probation, without any jail time, so long as he does not re-offend.[654]
Ronaldo and another man were investigated by the British Crown Prosecution Service after a 2005 rape allegation was brought forward by two women. Within days, the two women withdrew their allegation and Scotland Yard later issued a statement declaring there was not enough evidence for a prosecution.[655]
In April 2017, it was reported that Ronaldo was being investigated by the Las Vegas Police Department for an allegation by a woman that he had raped her in 2009.[656][657] Documents, confirmed by Ronaldo's lawyers, state that Ronaldo paid a woman US$375,000 in a non-disclosure settlement.[656][658] Ronaldo and his lawyers issued a lengthy statement denying all accusations, describing them as an "intentional defamation campaign" with parts significantly "altered and/or completely fabricated",[659][660] a claim which Der Spiegel categorically denied.[661] In July 2019, Las Vegas prosecutors said they would not charge Ronaldo over allegations of rape; the statement added: "Based upon a review of information at this time, the allegations of sexual assault against Cristiano Ronaldo cannot be proven beyond a reasonable doubt."[662] The same woman, in September 2018, filed a civil lawsuit in Nevada accusing Ronaldo of rape.[663] The Daily Mirror, citing court documents, reported in 2021 that the woman sought £56 million in damages from Ronaldo.[664] In October 2021, federal magistrate judge Daniel Albregts recommended that the lawsuit be dismissed, citing that the woman's lawyer, Leslie Stovall, "acted in bad faith by asking for, receiving, and using Football Leaks documents to prosecute" the case, despite the documents containing "privileged communications" between Ronaldo and his lawyers. Additionally, Albregts stated that no evidence was found of Ronaldo's lawyers having "intimidated [the woman] or impeded law enforcement" during the 2010 settlement with her.[665] In June 2022, the woman's rape lawsuit was dismissed with prejudice in the United States District Court for the District of Nevada, as district judge Jennifer A. Dorsey ruled that Stovall's repeated use of "cyber-hacked attorney–client privileged documents" were actions representing "abuses and flagrant circumvention of the proper litigation process".[663][666]