He has graced the world's best national team
,
unique talents; he has served as a peace ambassador for the United Nations. At 32, Ronaldo Luís Nazário de Lima has become one of the biggest celebrities in the world. His ability, dedication and charisma have made him one of the most recognisable faces around the globe. For the last 13 years Ronaldo has been an icon and a star of the Brazilian national team, having forged a hugely successful career based on not just talent, but determination and a quest for excellence.
Ronaldo was born on 22 September 1976 into a humble family in the Rio de Janeiro suburb of Bento Ribeiro. The youngest of three brothers, Dadado, as he was known during his childhood, didn’t take long to show signs of the ability which, by the time he had turned 20 in 1996 saw him officially hailed as the world’s best player – an accolade he received again in 1997 and in 2002.
Ronaldo started out playing futsal for Valqueire and then Social Ramos, two clubs in the Rio suburbs. He soon graduated to the eleven-a-side game with modest São Cristóvão. Though still young enough to turn out for their U17 team, in 1993 he was spotted, and signed, by Belo Horizonte outfit Cruzeiro, one of Brazil’s biggest clubs.
The boy wonder enjoyed a precocious start to his professional career and was soon revealing the full extent of his potential. Despite the fact he was still just 16, he scored 12 goals in 14 games in his first Brazilian Championship campaign. The following year, he scored 23 goals in the Mineiro State Championship, finishing as top scorer and helping Cruzeiro to the title. He was rewarded with a place in Brazil’s squad for the 1994 World Cup in the USA. Just like Pelé, he travelled to his first World Cup finals at the tender age of 17; and like Pelé he returned with the trophy. After USA’94, Brazil’s rising star was snapped up by Dutch club PSV Eindhoven where he made an immediate impact, helping them to win the Dutch Cup in 1995, and topping the Eredivisie scoring charts. So prolific was the Brazilian that his very presence on the pitch was enough to terrify opposition defenders. It was during this period that Ronaldo cemented his place in Brazil’s starting line-up, with a fine series of performances at the 1995 Umbro Cup. Overall, in two seasons in Holland he totalled a breathtaking 66 goals from 71 appearances. It did not go unnoticed elsewhere, and in the summer of 1996 he was signed by Spanish giants, Barcelona. He went on to enjoy an unforgettable campaign with the Catalan side, scoring an incredible 48 times in 51 matches in all competitions, including 34 goals in 37 La Liga appearances. It was during this first spell in Spain that Ronaldo invented his famous airplane celebration, now his trademark.
During his one season with Barca, Ronaldo won the Spanish Super Cup, the Spanish Cup and the European Cup Winners’ Cup. His explosive style, centred around his pace and unstoppable dribbling dazzled the Spanish football world. It also earned him admirers elsewhere, and in 1997 he was on the move again, this time to Italian giants, Inter Milan. So great were the excitement levels generated by his latest move, that some 60,000 supporters packed into the San Siro for his Inter debut, a friendly against Manchester United.
Despite coming up against the close marking and ‘catenaccio’ defending for which Italian football is renowned, Ronaldo was soon finding the net freely once more. And it wasn’t long before his goalscoring feats earned him the celebrated nickname of ‘Fenômeno’ (The Phenomenon).
Ronaldo scored 49 times in 68 games for Inter, and helped them to win the UEFA Cup in 1998. During the 1997/98 season he set a new benchmark for strikers in Italy, finishing the campaign with the best goal-per-game average in the history of Serie A.
It was during that first spell in Italy that Ronaldo also experienced the downside, suffering a serious knee injury in 1999. He subsequently aggravated it in 2000, and ended up sidelined for almost two years. Twice he had to go under the surgeon’s knife and then endured gruelling recuperation process.
However, when he finally recovered, the Fenômeno came back better than ever, dazzling football lovers around the globe at the 2002 World Cup. The striker was Brazil’s key man in Korea/Japan and he finished as the tournament’s top scorer on eight goals. Finally, the tragedy of the 1998 tournament, in which Brazil had lost the final to hosts France, was laid to rest; instead, they enjoyed the taste of victory once more, with Ronaldo scoring both goals in the 2-0 final win over Germany to write another epic chapter in the history of the World Cup.
Soon after the tournament, Ronaldo moved back to Spain, signing this time for the mighty Real Madrid. Before the year was out he had already added to his medal collection, helping the Merengue to win the Intercontinental Cup. By the end of his first campaign at the Bernabeu he had helped his new club to win the league title.
In 2006, Ronaldo travelled to his fourth consecutive World Cup finals with Brazil, knowing that he stood just two goals away from equalling Gerd Muller’s record of 14 goals in the tournament. Ronaldo drew level with ‘Der Bomber’ thanks to a double in Brazil’s 4-1 win over Japan in the group stages. And in their next match, against Ghana, he added another goal, taking his overall tally to 15, and making him the most prolific scorer in World Cup history.
In 2007, Ronaldo returned to Italy once more, this time to sign for AC Milan, in the hope that he might rekindle the success that led the Italian media to label him Fenômeno.
Ronaldo is not just a sporting superstar. He has harnessed his profile to campaign actively for world peace, and currently serves as an ambassador for the United Nations. In this role, he has been to a number of countries afflicted by war. In 2000 he travelled to Kosovo, where his presence was welcomed as a positive force for promoting an end to hostilities. In 2005, he visited Israel and Palestine as a peace emissary, helping to encourage unity between two peoples who have been driven apart by decades of conflict.
أنت غير مسجل في منتديات مضايف أبناء الحسون . للتسجيل الرجاء إضغط هنـا 
إعــلانــات المضايـف
العرض العادي
