A Tribute to Cristiano Ronaldo

On his 40th birthday, FIFA pays homage to the one-of-a-kind Portuguese martian with highlights, quotes, records, stats and trivia.

Beginnings

Cristiano Ronaldo dos Santos Aveiro was born in Funchal, on the picturesque island of Madeira, which sits 800 kilometres off mainland Portugal. He was named Ronaldo after his father’s favourite actor, Ronald Reagan, the then US president. Cristiano grew up in poverty, sharing a bedroom with his three siblings.
Ronaldo’s idols were Brazilian thrillers Ronaldo and Ronaldinho. As a 12-year-old, he joined Sporting, consequently moving to Lisbon on his own. He dropped out of school at 14 to focus on becoming a footballer.

 

The debut

A 17-year-old Ronaldo made his professional debut, as a substitute for Sporting against Inter Milan, in a UEFA Champions League qualifier in 2002. Marco Materazzi, Javier Zanetti, Alvaro Recoba and Cristian Vieri were among his opponents that day.

 

When Ronaldo made his pro debut…

Gmail, Myspace, YouTube and Wikipedia didn’t exist.
Hot in Here by Nelly, Complicated by Avril Lavigne and A Thousand Miles by Vanessa Carlton were flying high on singles’ charts across the globe.

Hollywood megastar Millie Bobby Brown, super influencer Charli D’Amelio and NBA All-Star Victor Wembanyama weren’t even born. Lamine Yamal was five years away from coming into this world.
Kim Kardashian had recently resigned from working in a clothing store to become a personal stylist.
Maurice Greene and Michael Johnson held the world records for the 100 and 200 metres respectively, Los Angeles Lakers – indebted to Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal – were fresh from sweeping the New York Nets to win a third consecutive NBA championship, Michael Schumacher was the reigning Formula One champion, and Lleyton Hewitt topped the men’s ATP Rankings.

Spider-Man, one of the most anticipated movies in history, and Men in Black II had just premiered. Film fans were salivating over the upcoming releases of Die Another Day, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets and The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.
Club highlights

Olá, Sir Alex

Arsenal, Barcelona and Liverpool were linked to Ronaldo following his eye-popping form in his first season with Sporting. After its end, Ronaldo tortured Manchester United as Sporting marked the inauguration of their Estadio Jose Alvalade with a 3-1 win. Roy Keane and other senior Red Devils, awestruck by the kid, urged Sir Alex Ferguson, who was already interested in Ronaldo, to sign him immediately. Six days later he was a United player. Ronaldo requested the No28 shirt, but was handed the No7 made sacred by George Best, Eric Cantona and David Beckham.

United Glory

Ronaldo, despite being afforded only 29 minutes from the bench against Bolton Wanderers, made one of the most electrifying debuts in Premier League history. It was a taster of what was to come. From the wing, he amazingly hit 31 goals in 34 Premier League appearances in 2007/08, making him the first and to date only non-forward to seize the European Golden Shoe, while his thunderbolt against Porto the following campaign made him the inaugural recipient of the FIFA Puskás Award. Ronaldo finished a six-season stint at Old Trafford having won three Premier League crowns, a UEFA Champions League and a FIFA Club World Cup™.

Manchester to Madrid

Real Madrid shattered the world transfer record when they finally landed Ronaldo for €94 million in 2009. It broke the €67 million they had recently paid AC Milan for Kaka. A staggering 80,000 supporters attended his presentation at the Santiago Bernabeu, breaking the global record of 75,000 Napoli fans welcoming Diego Maradona to Napoli from Barcelona.

Unreal Madrid

CR7 was nothing short of extraordinary for Los Blancos. He preposterously struck 50-plus goals in six successive seasons, scoring 450 times in 438 appearances for the club overall. As well as inspiring Real to two La Liga and three FIFA Club World Cup trophies, Ronaldo was fundamental in them winning four Champions League titles in five seasons.

An old man and an Old Lady

Some questioned whether the 33-year-old would be up to his next challenge at Juventus. It was one he passed emphatically. Ronaldo propelled La Vecchia Signora to five titles in three years, including back-to-back Scudetti, and left having netted 101 goals in 134 games.

Rampant in Riyadh

After a second spell at Manchester United, Ronaldo joined Al Nassr in 2022. He bagged both goals as they upset Al Hilal after extra time in the Arab Club Champions Cup final, and has 87 goals in 95 run-outs for The Big Yellow overall.

International highlights

The debut

With Portugal being held at home by Kazakhstan in 2003, Luiz Felipe Scolari sent Ronaldo on for his international debut for Luis Figo at the start of the second half. The 18-year-old was duly named Player of the Match in a 1-0 win.

Home-soil silver

The teenager propelled Portugal into the UEFA EURO 2004 final, only for them to be stunned by Greece in Lisbon. Ronaldo nevertheless made the Team of the Tournament alongside the likes of Michael Ballack, Figo, Wayne Rooney and Zinedine Zidane.

The wink

After Wayne Rooney stamped on Ricardo Carvalho during a Germany 2006 quarter-final, Ronaldo urged Horacio Elizondo to send his United team-mate off. When the referee did, Ronaldo infamously winked to his bench. He then scored the deciding spot-kick as Portugal won on penalties to reach the World Cup semi-finals for the first time in 40 years.

This is the story of how two teammates became enemies. Because at the World Cup it doesn’t matter where you play your club football, all that matters is winning.

Eclipsing Ibra

Ronaldo headed home a late winner in Lisbon as Portugal edged Sweden in the first leg of their play-off for a place at Brazil 2014. Zlatan Ibrahimovic scored twice in the return in Solna, but Ronaldo bagged a second-half hat-trick to snatch a 4-2 aggregate success.

Ruling Europe

Ronaldo performed a fundamental function in Portugal winning their first major trophy at EURO 2016. He enjoyed a memorable embrace with his old mentor Ferguson after a final upset of hosts France.

Titanic treble

Ronaldo scored one of the greatest hat-tricks in World Cup history against Spain at Russia 2018, a stunning free-kick late on snatching Portugal a 3-3 draw in their curtain-raiser.

Maiden kings

Ronaldo’s hat-trick earned Portugal a 3-1 win over Switzerland in the 2018/19 UEFA Nations League semi-finals, before he helped them sink the Netherlands in Porto and become its maiden champions.

Outranking Ali

Ronaldo was a winger who netted 12 goals in his first 40 games for Portugal. Who could, at that time, have possibly imagined he would go on to become the leading scorer in men’s international football history? You know who. “I always believed it was possible,” stated Cristiano after a preposterous run of 49 goals in 47 games catapulted him past Ali Daei (109 goals) and on to the throne in 2021. Ronaldo now has 135 goals in 217 internationals – 23 clear of his nearest rival, Lionel Messi.

FIFA World Cup milestones

Ronaldo’s goal against IR Iran at Germany 2006 made him, at 21 years and 132 days, the youngest Portuguese to score in the World Cup. He stole the record from Antonio Simoes, who was 22 at England 1966.
Ronaldo, at the age of 33 years and 130 days, struck a treble against Spain to become the oldest hat-trick scorer in World Cup history. Rob Rensenbrink, who was 30 years and 335 days when he netted thrice against IR Iran at Argentina 1978, is the only other 30-something to register a hat-trick in the competition.

Ronaldo, on 36 goals from 47 appearances, is the all-time leading scorer in UEFA qualifying for the World Cup. He is followed by Robert Lewandowski (30) and Andriy Shevchenko (26). Guatemala legend Carlos Ruiz (39) is the only player with more goals in the World Cup preliminaries.

Before Ronaldo, Portugal had never qualified for back-to-back World Cups. Qatar 2022 was their sixth in succession.

Antonio Carbajal, Lothar Matthaus, Rafa Marquez, Messi, Ronaldo and Andres Guardado are the only men to play in five World Cups.

Ronaldo converted a penalty against Ghana in Portugal’s Qatar 2022 opener to become the first man in history to score in five World Cups. Uwe Seeler, Pele, Miroslav Klose and Lionel Messi have been on target in four editions.
Only Lionel Messi (26), Lothar Matthaus (25), Miroslav Klose (24) and Paolo Maldini (23) have made more World Cup appearances than Ronaldo (22).

Ronaldo is the third-oldest marksman in World Cup history (37 years and 292 days) behind Pepe (39 years and 283 days) and Roger Milla (42 years and 39 days).

Other goalscoring feats

Ronaldo’s 14 goals make him the all-time leading marksman at the EURO. Michel Platini is next on nine.
With 450 goals in 438 matches, Ronaldo is Real Madrid’s all-time leading marksman ahead of Karim Benzema (354) and Raul (323).

The Portuguese holds the records for the most goals in the UEFA Champions League (140) and the most in one of its seasons (17).

Ronaldo has scored an unprecedented seven FIFA Club World Cup goals.
At Qatar 2022, Ronaldo became the first man ever to score in 10 consecutive international tournaments.
Ronaldo has won the IFFHS World’s Top Goalscorer award five times. Messi and Roberto Lewandowski are next on two apiece. Cristiano Ronaldo has registered a record 923 official career goals. Second-placed Lionel Messi in on 850.

The leap

Ronaldo’s aerial ability is comparable to that of Michel Jordan in the NBA. As well as being a powerful and precise header of a ball, he boasts the highest recorded jump in football history: 2.93 meters for Real Madrid against Manchester United in 2013. He also netted an exceptional header from a 2.57-metre leap for Juventus against Sampdoria in 2019.

The celebration

Ronaldo first performed his ‘Siuuu’, a way of saying ‘Yes’, in 2013. It has become one of the most famed celebrations in sport, copied by footballers galore and MLB, NBA and NFL athletes.

The Best

Ronaldo has won FIFA’s top annual individual award five times (2008, 2013, 2014, 2016 and 2017). Only eight-time recipient Messi has triumphed more.

Celebrity

Cristiano is the most-followed person on Instagram (648 million). Next come Lionel Messi (504 million), Selena Gomez (422 million), The Rock (395 million) and Kylie Jenner (394 million).
Ronaldo is the most-liked person on Facebook (171 million) ahead of Shakira (123 million), and is the third-most followed person on X (115 million) behind Barack Obama (131 million) and Elon Musk (216 million).
UR Cristiano, his channel, became easily the fastest to reach one million subscribers on YouTube, amazingly doing so within 90 minutes of its launch in August 2024.

Ronaldo topped all four editions of the ESPN World Fame 100 (2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019).
Ronaldo has topped Forbes’ World’s Highest-Paid Athletes four times (2016, 2017, 2023 and 2024) and has placed in the top three in each of the last 12 years.
In September 2024 Ronaldo became the first person to hit one billion followers across social media platforms.

Personal life

Maria Dolores revealed that, had he not become a footballer, her youngest son would have become a bricklayer.
Cristiano’s favourite food is Bacalhau à Brás, a Portuguese dish made with cod, thinly-sliced potatoes, onion, eggs, olives and parsley.

Ronaldo owns a mind-blowing car collection valued at around $28 million. It includes a Bugatti Centodieci, which cost $9m and was one of only 10 made, and a McLaren Senna built to honour Formula One god Ayrton Senna. He also boasts Aston Martins, Audis, BMWs, Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Maseratis, Porsches and Rolls-Royces.
Katia, Cristiano’s sister, is a Latin pop singer once known as Ronalda.

Tourist destinations Ronaldo loves are AlUla, Dubai, London, Madeira, New York, Paris and The Red Sea.
Cristiano has an eclectic taste in music but particularly enjoys listening to hip-hop and R&B, reggaeton, samba, Latin and electronic dance.

Ronaldo met his partner Georgina Rodriguez in 2016 when he went to a Gucci store to buy a suit and she was working as a shop assistant.
The University of British Columbia incredibly offers a sociology course studying The Phenomenon of Cristiano Ronaldo.

In his seldom free time, Ronaldo enjoys playing poker and table tennis, collecting luxury watches, and watching documentaries, series, tennis, the NBA and the UFC.

Source: norvanreports.com