Cristiano Ronaldo has announced the end of his exceptional Portugal career. FIFA pays tribute with 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
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.
When Ronaldo made his Portugal debut…
• Facebook, Gmail and YouTube didn’t exist. Myspace had been launched earlier that month.
• Crazy in Love by Beyonce featuring Jay-Z, In da Club by 50 Cent, Bring Me to Life by Evanescence featuring Paul McCoy and Where Is the Love? by the Black Eyes Peas flying high on singles’ charts across the globe.
• Michael Johnson held the world record for the 200 metres, Andre Agassi was the reigning Australian Open champion, Chinese rookie Yao Min was taking the NBA by storm, Michael Schumacher was the reigning Formula One champion having become the only driver to achieve a podium finish in every Grand Prix, and Lennox Lewis had just TKO’d Vitali Klitschko in ‘The Battle of the Titans’.
• Films Bruce Almighty, Finding Nemo, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl and The Matrix Reloaded were proving huge box-office hits.
• Hollywood megastar Millie Bobby Brown, super influencer Charli D’Amelio and NBA All-Star Victor Wembanyama weren’t even born. Lamine Yamal was four years away from coming into this world.
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.
First World Cup
Ronaldo thrived at Germany 2006. He scored in victory over IR Iran and helped Portugal edge the Netherlands in ‘The Battle of Nuremberg’. After Wayne Rooney stamped on Ricardo Carvalho in the quarter-finals, 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.
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 Sir Alex 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 retired with 146 goals in 234 internationals – 20 clear of his nearest rival Lionel Messi, who made his final Argentina appearance earlier this year.
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, became the oldest hat-trick scorer in World Cup history against Spain in 2018. 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 41 goals from 52 appearances, is the leading scorer in World Cup qualifying history. He is followed by Guatemala’s Carlos Ruiz (39), Argentina’s Lionel Messi (36), Poland’s Robert Lewandowski (35) and IR Iran’s Ali Daei.
• Before Ronaldo, Portugal had never qualified for back-to-back World Cups. The 2026 edition was their seventh in succession.
• Ronaldo and Messi are the only men to play in six World Cups. Ronaldo is the only man to score in six.
• Only one person has scored at six different FIFA World Cup tournaments.
That person is Cristiano Ronaldo.
• Ronaldo hit a double against Uzbekistan in Houston to outrank Eusebio and become Portugal’s top scorer in the tournament. Ronaldo has 11 World Cup goals to Eusebio’s nine.
• Ronaldo equalised against Croatia in Toronto at 41 years and 147 days. It made him the second-oldest marksman in the competition’s history behind Roger Milla, who was 42 years and 39 days.
• Ronaldo sits second for the most World Cup appearances with 27. Messi has 34.
Other goalscoring feats
• Ronaldo’s 14 goals at the EURO make him the all-time leading marksman at the tournament. Michel Platini is next on nine.
• At Qatar 2022, Ronaldo became the first man ever to score in 10 consecutive international tournaments. His amazing run ended at EURO 2024.
• Ronaldo netted in a world-record 23 calendar years. Lionel Messi is next on 21.
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 (679 million). Next come Lionel Messi (517 million), Selena Gomez (402 million), Kylie Jenner (381 million) and The Rock (380 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).
• In September 2024 Ronaldo became the first person to hit one billion followers across social media platforms.
• Ronaldo has topped Forbes’ World’s Highest-Paid Athletes a record six times (2016, 2017, 2023, 2024, 2025 & 2026) and has placed in the top three in each of the last 14 years.
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 wife 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.
Quotes
“There have been a few players described as ‘the new George Best’ over the years, but this is the first time it’s been a compliment to me.”
George Best on an 18-year-old Ronaldo
“Cristiano Ronaldo is better than me by far. The stats speak for themselves. He’s the best player in the history of football.”
Zinedine Zidane
“Animal. He was the first one in every single day. He would be the last one to leave the training pitch, the last one to leave the building every day. This was the days before Instagram and Twitter and doing it for the ‘Gram. He was doing it for himself, he just wanted to be the best he could possibly be. The question between Messi and Ronaldo, I’ll always say Ronaldo. He’s a machine. That level of mentality, phwoah.”
Ben Foster, Ronaldo’s former Manchester United team-mate
“Cristiano Ronaldo’s mentality was totally different from that of a 17-year-old boy. We played football and he was the best, we played pool and he beat everyone, we went to the gym and he lifted more than everyone else. He reminded me of Michael Jordan.”
Rodrigo Tello, Ronaldo’s former Sporting team-mate
Factfile
First international: v Kazakhstan (20 August 2003)
Final international: v Wales (24 September 2026)
Caps: 234
Goals: 146
Wins: 142
Draws: 54
Losses: 38
Titles: UEFA EURO (2016), UEFA Nations League (2019 & 2025)
FIFA.
