Cristiano Ronaldo

Cristiano Ronaldo is a Portuguese soccer player with Saudi Pro League club Al-Nassr who rose to global fame across spells with Manchester United, Real Madrid and Juventus. Ronaldo was the highest-paid athlete in the world in 2024, per Sportico’s rankings.

Ronaldo has benefitted financially from his unconventional move to the Saudi Arabia-based league, which preceded other big-name players, such as Neymar and Karim Benzema, making transfers to clubs in the Gulf nation.

Ronaldo, nicknamed “CR7” because of his initials and kit number, is one of the most prolific goal scorers in soccer history. The forward even has his own globally famous celebration: He leaps in the air, spreads his limbs wide and shouts “Siuuu.”

Many of Ronaldo’s most productive seasons came when he played at Real Madrid, where he landed following a transfer from Manchester United in 2009 for a then-record fee. He has continued to score at a high rate, having extended his streak of seasons with double-digit goal outputs to 19 in the 2024-25 campaign.

Ronaldo has won five Ballons d’Or— the international soccer equivalent of an MVP trophy in major American sports. He turned 40 years old in February 2025 but has yet to indicate when he might retire.

In 2024, Ronaldo became the first celebrity to reach a combined 1 billion followers on social media, with the majority of them coming from Instagram. He often shares pictures with his longtime girlfriend, Georgina Rodriguez, and his five children, among them a soccer-playing son, Cristiano Ronaldo Jr., who competes within Al-Nassr’s youth academy.