Cristiano Ronaldo: The Success Story of a Portuguese Legend

Cristiano Ronaldo is the famous football player currently playing for the Spanish club named Real Madrid. He is a Portuguese professional player. He also plays for the Portugal national team. Cristiano is considered as the best footballer of all time with excellent skills.

He was the youngest expensive teenager playing in the Manchester United at that time.

Early life of Cristiano

Cristiano Ronaldo was born on 5th February 1985 in Funchal, Madeira. His full name is Cristiano Ronaldo dos Santos Aveiro. His family conditions were very poor and his father was the only source of income.

Cristiano Ronaldo: The Success Story of a Portuguese Legend

Image source: Boombastis.com

Cristiano Ronaldo also had one brother and two sisters with whom he shared room. His father was a municipal gardener. From the very early age, Cristiano started playing football with bottles or sometimes rags of paper molded in the shape of ball. Thus, he acquired excellent skills at this age which made him the best player in his locality.

At the age of 8 years, he went to Andorinha Sports Club in Madeira. There he proved his true spirit for football. After some time, he was the best in his whole group.

Two years later, he proceeded to Nacional Football Club. There he also gave his best. His total focus was on football. Thus, he developed fast paced skills which was special in his age group.

At the age of 11, Portuguese Sporting Club after consideration, selected him. They signed him for 1,500 pounds. For this he shifted to Lisbon, Portugal and that was tough time for him. It was too hard for him to leave his family at the age of 11. Since he always wanted to improve himself and wanted to pursued his dreams, he shifted to Lisbon.

Portuguese Sporting Club

Shifting away from his island, was a big decision. Many times, Cristiano cried and missed his family too much. But instead of this he never deviated his mind from football. Even he kept on working in improving himself.

He always tried his best. He couldn’t take defeat in his hands. Sometimes, he even began to cry for his defeat. He always wanted to win whether it was a practice session or a match. Therefore, he made himself stronger and stronger just to win every time.

Later, coach Leonel Pontes supported him. He was also originally from Madeira so he was the one who could guide him better. He helped Cristiano in every aspect. Leonel Pontes sometimes talked to his parents and gave them hope for Ronaldo’s good future.

At the age of 15, he faced heart problem known as Tachycardia which leads to rapid heartbeat than normal. Doctor recommended him not to run and do any hard work.

At this stage, when football was everything for Cristiano, he took decision to cure it through risky surgery. Fortunately, surgery was successful and Ronaldo came to ground for practice after few days.

Main turn came into his life when he played his match for Portugal Sporting Club against Manchester United on 6th August 2003. He was 17 years old but the way he played in that match was spectacular. He tried every possible move to be in touch with ball.

Ronaldo was running from left to right, right to left and impressed everyone with his skills. Cristiano amazed everyone. That day was meant for Ronaldo to shine.

Six days later, on 12th August 2003, Cristiano signed to play with Manchester United. Manchester united paid a very high amount for him worth 12.24 million pounds. Thus, it made Cristiano highest paid youngster of that time.

Manchester United

Cristiano played for Manchester United from August 2003- May 2009. He made his first appearance in the premier league on 16th August 2003. That day, he again amazed the audience and received appreciation from everyone.

While Cristiano was playing for Manchester united, they won many matches and trophies. Everyone appreciated the presence of Cristiano in the team. Some of the big achievements are:

Year 2003-04, leaded to success in the Football Association Challenge Cup or FA Cup. In this, Ronaldo scored one goal against Miller and Manchester United won the match by 3-0.
Won Premier League successively for continuous 3 years i.e. in 2006-07, 2007- 08, 2008-09.
Had Football League Cup or EFL Cup in the year 2005-06 and 2008-09.
FA Community Shield 2007, match had rivalries facing each other as Manchester United and Chelsea. Manchester United won the match and got shield on their side.
Year 2007-08, Manchester united played final with Chelsea and won UEFA Champions League by 3-0 on penalties after draw of 1-1.
One of the biggest achievement was FIFA World Cup 2008. Match was played between Manchester United and LDU Quito. Manchester united won the match with the lead of 1-0.

Real Madrid

Real Madrid paid 80 million pounds and got Cristiano in its team. Contract was from 2009-2015 but later contract was extended up to 2021. Cristiano with his unique talent skills again proved himself with many achievements in the hands of Real Madrid.

Initially, Cristiano had shirt number 9 since shirt number 7 was unavailable. Before session of 2010-11 he got his number 7 back. Some achievements Ronaldo had, while he was in Real Madrid are:

Copa Del Rey, which is the oldest Spanish football competition was won by Real Madrid two times in the session of 2010-11 and 2013-14.
La Liga 2011-12, ended up making winner to Real Madrid for the 32nd times and match was quite spectacular. Recently, for the session of 2016-17, again Real Madrid won this title.
Supercopa de España is the Spanish football competition which is played between winners of La Liga and Copa Del Rey. This match was played in 2012 between Real Madrid and Barcelona. It was won by Real Madrid by the Away Goals rule.
UEFA Super Cup 2012, one of the major achievement of Real Madrid.
Real Madrid won the UEFA Champion’s League three times in the session of 2013-14, 2015-16 and 2016-17.
Year 2014 and 2016, Real Madrid won International football competition, FIFA Club World Cup.
Cristiano Ronaldo was honored by four FIFA Ballon d’Or Awards.This award goes to the football male player who performed well in the previous year. Football journalists decide the winner of the award by voting.
He also has four European Golden Shoe.

Conclusion

Cristiano was dedicated and passionate about his dreams from a very early age. Thus, he deprived himself from many beloved things. He left his hometown Madeira and shifted far away in Lisbon to improve himself. Cristiano missed and cried for his parents but still instead of leaving everything he pursued his training.

Image source: Instagram.com / @cristiano

Even a heart problem couldn’t stop him. He established himself in front of all senior players and through continuous hard work.

Cristiano took football game to another level and showed the amount of hard work someone needed to pursue his dreams. He wanted to show his parents that he can achieve all the things he had dreamed of and he did.

Today, Cristiano Ronaldo is known as the best player in the world and these are the sweet fruits of his hard work and dedication.

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