Cristiano Ronaldo’s first year in Saudi Arabia has seen bucket loads of goals and glamour as he and Georgina Rodriguez have become the Gulf’s power couple
It’s one year since Cristiano Ronaldo touched down in Saudi Arabia and the football world shifted on its axis.
Following an acrimonious end to his second spell with Manchester United, the Portuguese superstar decided to follow the money and ended up in the Middle-East.
With Al-Nassr paying him a staggering £175million-a-year to come and play in the Saudi Pro League, Ronaldo became in a stroke the world’s highest-earning athlete aged 37.
Ronaldo – and the vast wealth available – also proved to be a gravitational force, pulling other big names to a previously unheralded and mediocre competition.
Neymar, Karim Benzema, Roberto Firmino, Jordan Henderson, Sadio Mane and N’Golo Kante are just some of the well-known names who have followed him to the Kingdom.
Has Ronaldo’s first year there been successful?
Ronaldo has never been far from the headlines, for good reasons and bad, as Saudi football finds itself under a fiercely-burning spotlight.
Ronaldo is 38 but continues to score goals in prodigious quantities, with 43 in 49 appearances for Al-Nassr since his arrival.
Combined with his international goals for Portugal, he has struck 53 this calendar year and shows no sign of slowing down. He looks certain to make another major tournament – his 11th – at Euro 2024.
But despite this regular stream of goals, Ronaldo has yet to claim much silverware, the main driving aim of his career.
Arriving midway through the 2022-23 Pro League campaign, he was unable to inspire Al-Nassr to the title as they finished five points behind rivals Al-Ittihad.
Ronaldo has work to do this season as well – while he is the league’s top goalscorer, Al-Nassr trail Neymar’s Al-Hilal by seven points after 18 rounds of the campaign.
He did win the Arab Champions Cup back in August, however, with his two goals in the final powering Al-Nassr to a 2-1 win over Al-Hilal.
They did also make it safely into the knockout rounds of the AFC Champions League, going undefeated in the group stage, and will face fellow Saudi club Al-Fayha in the last-16 in February.
Ronaldo, a five-time winner of the European Champions League, will be desperate to claim the Asian version as well. But domestic success is far from guaranteed for him.
Obviously his mere presence has done wonders for the Saudi Pro League, with engagement rising 4,000 per cent.
Occasionally, Ronaldo does his bit to promote Saudi Arabia, presumably part of his eye-watering contract to play there.
Earlier this month, his 616 million Instagram followers were treated to pictures of Ronaldo and his partner Georgina Rodriguez visiting the ancient oasis city of Alula.
In September, he donned Saudi national dress and wielded a sword to mark the country’s National Day. We can expect plenty more of this.
In return, Ronaldo, Rodriguez and his five children have been treated like royalty since they settled in Saudi.
Originally put up in a luxury Riyadh hotel, they have moved into a property in an exclusive gated community with round-the-clock security.
Both have quickly become stars on the social scene in the country.
Ronaldo is unfailingly the centre of everyone’s attention even in the star-studded audience of the big boxing events which have become a regular feature of the Saudi sporting calendar.
At the crossover bout between Tyson Fury and Francis Ngannou, the audience featured rappers Eminem and Kanye West, as well as former UFC champion Conor McGregor, but Ronaldo and Georgina were the main attraction.
Perhaps it’s little wonder Ronaldo was seated next to McGregor for last week’s ‘Day of Reckoning’ boxing showpiece. Given the pictures became instant memes, it was PR gold dust.
You also only have at the crazy scenes in Iran when Al-Nassr played Persepolis in the AFC Champions League to understand Ronaldo’s enduring global popularity.
Presented with a traditional Persian rug as a welcome gift at the airport, the Al-Nassr team bus was literally chased by hundreds of fans eager to catch a glimpse of their idol.
The lobby of the team hotel was then mobbed by thousands more but it’s all a circus Ronaldo has become well accustomed to.
Ironically, the actual match in Tehran was played behind closed doors due to a sanction imposed on Persepolis.
Rodriguez, 29, has also thrown herself into the local social scene. Tatler magazine said the influencer has already amassed a devoted following in Saudi and her appearance at the Joy Awards caused a huge stir, overshadowing ‘Person of the Year’, the actress Sofia Vergara.
If there are any reservations about Saudi ‘sportwashing’ to cover up human rights abuses in the country, it doesn’t seem to have affected Ronaldo’s lucrative sponsorship deals.
A quick trawl through recent Instagram posts throws up endorsements for Nike, fitness tool Sixpad, the tourist board for his home island of Madeira, his CR7 fragrances, watchmaker Jacob & Co, and cryptocurrency exchange Binance.
The latest Forbes highest-paid athletes list put his 2022-23 off-field earnings at $90m [just over £70m].
Obviously not everything has been plain-sailing since Ronaldo’s move.
Some still like to bring up Ronaldo’s rivalry with Lionel Messi, who won his eighth Ballon d’Or award this year after he helped Argentina win the World Cup. Ronaldo has a mere five.
No doubt Ronaldo felt the sting when rival fans rubbed it in with ‘Messi, Messi’ chants at Al-Nassr’s next match – against Al-Ettifaq in the King’s Cup.
Ronaldo shushed and cupped his ears to the crowd in return as Al-Nassr won the game 1-0 thanks to a goal by Mane.
He also clashed with former Liverpool midfielder Henderson at full-time and was fortunate to avoid getting sent off for dissent.
In the Champions League match against Shabab Al-Ahli of the United Arab Emirates, Ronaldo screamed at the referee and brushed aside a fan wanting a selfie as he stormed off the pitch.
There was also a rumoured falling out with Rudi Garcia, the coach who left Al-Nassr in April and the crotch-grabbing incident that has some calling for a charge of indecency.
But many fans are still turning out to see him – while there has been plenty of mockery over dismal attendance in the low hundreds for run-of-the-mill Pro League games, Al-Nassr do generally draw in decent crowds.
Their average this season is 20,308, second only to the 26,842 attracted by Al-Hilal.
It’s fair to say Saudi football is a world removed from Old Trafford or the Bernabeu but it offers Ronaldo the opportunity to further burnish a glittering career.
The goals are certainly flowing and his family are settled. Now he needs the silverware to follow.