Football also has its gods and Maradona and Ronaldo the Brazilian have been the strongest ever. The only ones able to win matches on their own. Martian technique, physical strength and the charisma of numbers 1. Maybe Pele can be with them but we stop here. When they took the ball they shot a film and made their opponents being drunk to the point of making them lose their bearings. When they were carrying the ball forward they could not be stopped. They simply scored when they wanted, regardless of the difficulty and importance of the match. They scored when they wanted even in the world cup finals. And they had the elegance and touch of a panther.
Luca di Montezemolo said he didn't like when Ferraris were sold to footballers because they didn't really use them and kept them in the garage. And we agree with him. But for Maradona and Ronaldo we want to make an exception.
Ferrari is that red thread that unites the champions of all sports and successful men from all over the world in a single large garden, that of childhood. It is by driving a Red that the miracle of eliminating all differences is realized. Only a Ferrari and a rolling ball can do this. This is why Maradona and Ronaldo deserve to be there, in spite of all their flaws.
Diego Maradona - el diez of God
"Oh mamma mamma mamma, oh mamma mamma mamma, lo sai perché mi batte il corazón? Ho visto Maradona, ho visto Maradona, uè mammà, innamorato son", Napoli fans were singing in a chorus that has remained in the history of football.
Diego Armando Maradona is football. No football player has ever played or will ever play like him. From his words and those of his opponents you can get to understand the caliber of the man and that of the player better than in any other way.
Diego Maradona said:
“Football is a sport based on deception because you make your opponent believe you’re going one way and instead you’re going the other.”
"I don’t like English football. Besides, I only want to train in the afternoon."
“If I wore a white dress at a wedding and a muddy ball came, I would stop it with my chest without thinking about it.”
“You were only a goalkeeper.”
“To see the ball, to run after it, makes me the happiest man in the world.”
“My mother thinks I am the best. And I was raised to always believe what my mother tells me.”
“There would be no debate about who was the best footballer the world had ever seen - me or Pele. Everyone would say me.”
“Messi scores a goal and celebrates. Cristiano scores a goal and poses like he’s in a shampoo commercial.”
“I don't for a second regret scoring that goal with my hand.”
“When people succeed, it is because of hard work. Luck has nothing to do with success.”
“I am on the left end, fully on the left end: as for foot, faith, brain.”
“I run, I fight, but, above all, dialogue with the ball, to entertain people."
“Three years here in Naples gave me a lot, but they also took so much away from me. I can't go out, in three years I haven't learned a street of Naples.”
“If I'm not happy inside, I can't be a champion.”
“Better loving a beautiful and stupid woman. In fact, it's better to be both beautiful and stupid.”
“Leo Messi is still looking for his own style and I think he will find it soon. Mine was very recognizable already at the beginning of my career. Maybe that's why I could be listed as better than Leo. He scored more goals? True, but mine were much more beautiful.”
“In my opinion Icardi is a traitor. He goes to [Maxi Lopez's] house, plays at being a friend and then he steals his woman. This is treason. In our time, if you were just looking at a teammate's woman, in the dressing room we would take turns to punch him."
“I am forty-five years old and I don't think I will play again. I don't have the courage to disrespect the ball."
“Many people want to give me a gun for me to kill myself. Stop doing it."
“You can't be a phenomenon every day of the year. Even Maradona did not always play like Maradona.”
“The first goal? Partly with the head of Maradona and partly with the hand of God. Is the second goal a marvel? Please, the only marvel I know is Raquel Welch.”
“Bigon said he needed eleven people to run. So I explained him that he couldn't count on me, I have never run in my life.”
"In the clinic where I am, there is someone who thinks he is Napoleon and someone else Robinson Crusoe. They don't believe me when I say I'm Maradona."
His colleagues said about him:
“For players like Maradona, Van Basten, Cruijff, Pele, the goal started 16 meters earlier. It was too easy for them.” Gianluigi Buffon
"At best I can be the third best footballer in the world, because the first is Diego, the second is always Diego and then there is me and other players who are very detached.” Careca
“In four years I never heard him once scolding a teammate. He never made his talent weigh, for those who were wrong he always had a word of encouragement, never a rebuke.” Ottavio Bianchi
“He had complete mastery of the ball. When Maradona ran with the ball or dribbled through the defence, he seemed to have the ball tied to his boots. I remember our early training sessions with him: the rest of the team were so amazed that they just stood and watched him. We all thought ourselves privileged to be witnesses of his genius.” Barca team mate Lobo Carrasco
“I’ve never seen such things. In training, during warmups, I’ve never seen anyone else do those things. Unfortunately what us team-mates saw the crowd couldn’t see. You realize that what you saw during the week was unrepeatable. In training you could see the real Maradona and it was quite a spectacle. He never lost a practice match.” Naples team mate Francesco Romano
“There will never be anyone like Maradona again, not even if Messi wins three World Cups in succession or scores a bicycle kick from midfield.” Argentina team mate Hector Enrique
“Maradona was by far the best player I've ever played with.” Mario Kempes
“The best player I’ve seen in my life. He did things that didn’t seem humanly possible. When he was on top of his game and even without training that much he was always in form, he was simply impossible to control. He decided matches alone, carrying average teams like Napoli and Argentina in 1986 to glorious achievements. A genius.” Marcel Desailly
“For Maradona to win a World Cup on his own and let’s face it, that’s what he did as the rest of the team were ordinary, was an amazing achievement. He was the best player I’ve seen.” Glenn Hoddle
“Some say Pele was the greatest player of all time, but not me. Maradona will always be the greatest. He won World Cup in 1986, narrowly lost in the final in 1990 and then in 1994 maybe would have won it again had he not been banned. The crucial difference with Pele is that Maradona wasn’t surrounded by great players; he had to carry the team himself. If you took Maradona out of Argentina they would not win the World Cup, but I think Brazil without Pele would still have won.” Eric Cantona
”Even if I played for a million years, I’d never come close to Maradona. Not that I’d want to anyway. He’s the greatest there’s ever been.” Lionel Messi
”What Zidane could do with a ball, Maradona could do with an orange.” Michel Platini
“Maradona epitomized the mystique of the working class revolution: aloof and arrogant like the 1980s.” Manuel Vazquez Montalban
“The best player I’ve ever played against, miles ahead of anyone else. As you saw in the World Cup quarter-final in 1986, I just couldn’t get near him – all I ever saw was his number 10! He had a low centre of gravity that shielded the ball, he had strength, pace and his passing was excellent. He also had a great leap for such a small man, as he showed with his Hand of God goal!” Terry Butcher
“With him on the ball, you didn’t know where he finished and where the ball started.” José Mourinho
“Football is a sport for everyone, nothing special is needed. Both the slow and the fast can play and become a champion. Who is big and tall and who was born and raised without ever looking like an athlete. The greatest champion of the past 20 years has been Diego Armando Maradona. He is one meter and 68 centimeters tall and has never weighed less than 70 kilos. Trivial measures. Dribbling and theatrical blows were known about Maradona, not everyone knows that it was very difficult to take the ball away from him by pressing. Maradona had too many technical skills. He went around the opponent, or perhaps threw in first time his teammate, or touched back or to the side. You could only take the ball away from him if the pressure caught him from behind.” Roberto Baggio
“For us at Napoli he was only Diego. He never made us weigh his superiority. He never said: guys, give me the ball I'll take care of. He didn't look at himself, he was generous and he thought of the team. He was a perfect companion.” Salvatore Bagni
“During a match Juventus-Napoli in the dressing room we told each other that the only way to stop him was to beat him badly. But, after ten minutes on the pitch, we looked at each other and said that no, it was too good to see him play.” Zbigniew Boniek
“Maradona was the greatest of all because he did with oranges what we footballers seemed impossible to do with the ball.” Franco Baresi
“There isn't one who plays like Maradona. Once Pele. Today Maradona.” Lev Jašin
“Playing against Maradona is like playing against time because you know that sooner or later he will either score or let somebody else score. Maradona was a sublime player from another planet.” Arrigo Sacchi
“Talent does not increase by one ounce: by training you do not get Ronaldo's speed, Maradona's touch, Messi's dribbling.” Javier Zanetti
“Pele or Maradona? I challenge anyone to choose. And the answer can only be both.” Dino Zoff
Of Maradona it is enough to say that everything he did on a football pitch was perfectly unreasonable. Beyond everything else, no ball ever had a better experience than when it was at his left foot. Fans of all neighborhoods betrayed their favourite teams to see that genius for whom a patch of land was more than a large estate. Some confused him with God and when you are little more than a child you have no reason to question the opinion of adults.” Jorge Valdano
“[Maradona] is football, he is the ball, as if his face were on that spinning ball. What Maradona did with the ball never did anyone and nobody will ever do. He did extraordinary things, everything there was to do he did.” Francesco Totti
“The best player there has ever been, better than Pele. I watched him closely in Italy every week and he was at a different level to everyone else. Some of the things he did were unbelievable. He could control the ball without looking, which meant if the pass was on, he would take it. Maradona was the "complete package". He wasn't just a great footballer, he was a leader. He knew how to win alone, as he did in the World Cup. He was a very good person. His problem was that he wanted everyone to love him. And when the reporters teased him, he got hurt and reacted immediately. In his heart he was a good person. When I see Messi I think he is a great footballer but he is protected: by referees, by cameras, by regulation. Messi can just dribble. Diego had to jump that high, not to dribble but because they wanted to break his legs.” Ruud Gullit
Diego Maradona was not only the greatest footballer, but also the most honest. He was a model of good behavior on the pitch. He respected everyone, from top players to 'normal' players. He was always harassed by fouls and never complained, not like some of today's strikers.” Paolo Maldini
“When Diego scored that second goal against us, I felt like applauding. I’d never felt like that before, but it’s true… and not just because it was such an important game. It was impossible to score such a beautiful goal. He’s the greatest player of all time, by a long way. A genuine phenomenon.” Gary Lineker about the beautiful goal that Diego scored for his national team at the 1986 World Cup
“The best of the lot, no question. In my generation, my era, he was simply the best. I saw Maradona do things that God himself would doubt were possible. He always had someone marking him, he always had someone hanging on to him, and yet he could still always conjure up wonderful pieces of magic. A genius.” Zico
“Other than Messi and Ronaldo ... The best of all time is Maradona. I admired him at the 1986 and 1990 World Cup and throughout his career. Today there are many top players, such as Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, but I've never seen anyone else do the things I saw done by Maradona.” Ryan Giggs
“Today he would score even more. Maradona was a great player, a real example on the pitch. He has taken many of those blows in his career, other than Messi ... The ones who compare the two players make me laugh. Messi will also be a great player but Maradona was unique. Messi today plays with the two-three meters advantage of modern football. I would like to see Maradona with those meters advantage how many goals he would have made…” Pasquale Bruno
“How do you train Maradona? Simple: he is like a cat. It is enough for him to eat and rest to be the best.” His doctor and friend Rubén Oliva.
“Maradona is not really an example for young people. He had the chance to receive a gift from God, that of knowing how to play football. Despite his wild life, there are still people willing to give him a job. If they had a little conscience, they wouldn't do it anymore. If he doesn't change, he will never have a job again. He was a great player, but he is not an example.” Pelé
“A genius, a real artist, one of the greatest players in the world. He could win a match on his own. On his own.” Bobby Robson
“El pibe de oro”, certainly not a master of style, loved sports cars and had a taste in choosing his Reds. When he played in Italy he had a Ferrari F40 and a Testarossa, but in his garage there was also an F355 Spider. We cannot tell you if he was good at the wheel, but athletes in general have transversal qualities that suggest an affirmative answer.
Diego Maradona and the history of the black Ferrari Testarossa that he wanted to give back. The Ferrari Testarossa dates back to 1984 but still today, many years after its presentation, it continues to make fans from all over the world dream. The thrust, entrusted to a 5-liter 12-cylinder engine with 390 horsepower, is expressed with a great character, announced by the splendid shapes which never go out of fashion, the result of Pininfarina's genius.
Diego bought the Testarossa in Naples, shortly after becoming world champion with Argentina in Mexico 1986. Maradona spoke with Guillermo Coppola, who was his representative, to ask for a black Ferrari, when the Italian brand only generated cars in red. The car was paid by Corrado Ferlaino, president of Napoli at that time and it cost him 430 thousand dollars.
"It was worth $430,000 but I spent double the expense and added 130,000 to the painting," Ferlaino recalled. ''Diego asked about the stereo and I told him it didn't have one... it's a race car. No air conditioning, nothing and he said 'well, put it all in'..."
“Ferlaino couldn’t believe it“, recalls Guillermo Coppola.
Despite the lack of what the Argentinian considered basic luxuries, Maradona still kept the black Ferrari, a model that had first been made for Sylvester Stallone and then Michael Jackson, who made his convertible. The 1987 Testarossa, with white leather upholstery and just 20,200 kmts, was in the possession of a Spanish collector of high-end cars until 2014, when he decided to sell it for 250,000 euros.
The Ferrari F40 is the myth par excellence of the modern era. This 1987 sports car, Maradona’s one, tops the dreams of every enthusiast. It is the classic poster supercar, the one everyone would like in the garage. Driving it is an unforgettable experience, even for the masters of the steering wheel, accustomed to taking to the track with the most powerful and performing cars.
This extraordinary creature, the F40, was the last of Maranello presented when Enzo Ferrari was still alive.
Admiring its sublime forms and listening to the mechanical musicality of its 478-horsepower V8 twin-turbo engine gives an authentic pleasure, an overwhelming wave.
The Ferrari F355 Spider sports lines of great purity. It is an 8-cylinder berlinetta with an impeccable look, without details out of place. It has a truly sublime formal elegance. This car, presented in 1995, declined in an open key the F355 Berlinetta, heir to the 348, to deliver the emotions en plein air to the wealthiest fans of the "prancing horse".
The 90's saw the "Pelusa" returning to his beloved club Boca Juniors. He was seen at the time getting to training behind the wheel of a 1996 Ferrari F355 Spider, almost always with his representative Guillermo Coppola. In 2005 and with just 37,800 kilometers on the odometer, the red sports car was auctioned in an event organized by Diego Armando Maradona Producciones S.A. 66 offers were received and more than 3,400 inquiries were made for the car, until it was sold at US $ 670,150. The seller was identified only with the name 'Jorge'. That figure could have been higher; in fact, offers were received that were bordering on the 4 million dollars, but their origin was not clear and therefore they were discarded. After a couple of years, without being clear about the whereabouts of the vehicle, it was acquired in July 2009 by the clan of the brothers Gonzalo and Erwin Loza, a gang associated with drug trafficking and money laundering, through a car agency. "Presumably they laundered money," said the newspaper La Nación. The group was later disbanded, when the Argentine gendarmerie carried out an anti-drug operation. On the occasion 25 vehicles were seized, including the Ferrari that had been Maradona's. After the police action, the model passed into the hands of the State Property Administration Agency. Now, the future of the Ferrari F355 Spider is uncertain, since the State is allowed to auction it. We will have to wait to see who is encouraged to buy this gem that already has a striking pedigree.
It should be noted that only 3.717 units of this model, designed by Pininfarina, were shipped by the factory. The car had a V8 engine that developed 380 horsepower, associated with a 6-speed manual transmission, although later a F1-type transmission with paddles on the steering wheel would be added. As a detail, the F355 Spider was the first Ferrari convertible with a semi-automatic hood with electronic drive.
Diego Maradona visiting the Ferrari Academy in Dubai
Practice match with el Pibe de Oro and Michel Salgado, ex Real Madrid
Multiple training days for Fernando Alonso as part of an initiative organized in 2014 by the former sponsor of the Scuderia Ferrari, Santander. The Maranello team driver lent himself to being filmed and photographed while facing a series of multidisciplinary workouts. Fernando started with a cross training session, with the classic military-style course which plans to jump into some tires as quickly as possible. The second part of the training saw Alonso dedicate himself to karting. Fernando challenged some journalists in a short race, obviously reporting the victory. The following activity was another of Alonso's great passions, the bicycle, one of the main tools used by the Asturian to keep fit between races and during the winter.
Niki Lauda and Diego Maradona at Monte Carlo in 1995
At the Dubai Football Academy, the training day ended with another great love that Fernando shares with millions of people: football. The match was played between two teams which also included former Real Madrid footballer Michel Salgado and none other than Diego Armando Maradona. This time Alonso had to bow to the Pibe de Oro, but only for 5-4 ...
Maradona, Giordano and Careca, the trident that made Naples dream.
Giordano is sure of one thing: “if Diego would have played today, the matches wouldn’t have ended or they would always have ended up in goleada. When Maradona had the ball at his feet they tried to stop him in every way, with the current rules he would get expelled at least a couple of opponents per match. In order not to foul him you should let him score and then it would be inevitable that the matches would end 5 or 6 - 0 for his team". What if Giordano would have played today? "Ah, I don't know - he continues - But I don't even think about this, I'm happy and proud to have played in that Serie A. That was not simply the Italian championship but it was the world championship. For the real phenomena it was a point of arrival and I am proud to have played that Serie A and to have also won it."
Ronaldo – o maior camisa 9 da história do futebol
Ronaldo Luís Nazário de Lima didn’t have a bad life.
Apart from the injuries that have marked and limited his career, he did not miss much, including countless beautiful women, first of all Susana Werner who, together with the wife of Luis Figo, the great Portuguese footballer, remains among the most beautiful women ever in the football world.
Of German origins, Susan Werner from 1997 to 1999 had a relationship with Ronaldo that earned her the nickname of “Ronaldinha”. The trendiest couple on the planet.
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But, above all, Ronaldo knew how to play football well. He has been the best player in the world for years.
And he certainly would have been for more time if his knees hadn't betrayed him several times. And so, in the end, more than the defenders fate and bad luck stopped him. Burning sprint, supersonic speed, powerful legs, superfine technique, dribbling and drunking double steps. The football that was showed by the phenomenon from 1996 to 1998 has never been shown by any human being on this planet.
Bento Ribeiro is a neighborhood located in the north-west area of Rio de Janeiro, 46 thousand souls who live hand-to-mouth, incurring unbridgeable expenses and efforts. Within those walls of the "barrio" there was a boy who dribbled barefoot his peers but also the older ones with disarming ease. They said he was the son of Néllo O Dentist de Lima Pullastron, who named him Ronaldo in honor of the doctor who gave him life. Oh yes, that little tightrope walker will become O'Fenomeno.
These are his best-known phrases:
“We lost because we didn't win.”
“I'm sure sex wouldn't be so rewarding as this World Cup. It's not that sex isn't good but the World Cup is every four years and sex is not.”
“I love to score goals after passing all the defenders as well as the keeper. This is not my speciality, but my habit.”
“I don't consider myself as the best player in the world. I'm not obsessed with individual titles. I'm much more interested in being part of a team which wins trophies.”
“It will take time for us all to understand what has happened to us, but it is a joy to be surrounded by such happiness.”
“Goals are always in demand. There will always be a market for a striker who is fast, scores goals regularly and is strong. I've scored more than 100 goals and people know what they are buying.”
“I've never timed myself over 100m, but I have done a test over shorter distances, 20m or 30m, with and without the ball. What's strange is that I'm faster with the ball than without it. Some people are born for distance running and others for sprint.”
“I knew when I started playing professionally that being an idol means catering for fans. Without them, there's no game. I don't mind signing autographs, but what I really want to give fans are lots of goals.”
“Pele is the greatest player in football history and there would only be one Pele in the world.”
“In Brazil every kid starts playing street football very early. It's in our blood. As a professional I started at Sao Cristovao in the city of Rio de Janeiro. Of course I also played in the beach soccer league, barefoot.”
“In Latin America, the pace is slower, it is more technical. In Europe, it is faster, but I haven't had any problems adapting to it.”
“Every time I went away I was deceiving my mum. I'd tell her I was going to school but I'd be out on the street playing football. I always had a ball on my feet.”
“It's amazing. It is like yesterday when I was still watching the stars of Brazilian football on TV and I am one of them now. I miss my childhood. I left my family at 15 and then left Brazil for Holland when I was 17.”
“I'm here to score a lot of goals. It's my speciality, that's what I've been brought here to do and I want to score plenty; like I did with Barcelona. And here, there's every reason to think I can do it.”
“Everyone tells me that the Italian championship is the toughest in the world, but I'm not afraid. In my career, I've always scored goals, wherever I've been.”
The star born in the suburb of Rio de Janeiro assumed, at a very young age, the status of a world idol. And he repeatedly embodied the figure of the hero, especially when he got back in resounding shape in the face of injuries and then resurfaced as the top scorer of the five-time world champion Brazilian seleção. Ronaldo was fantastic, never holy: womanizer and party-goer, he also made the joy of paparazzi and gossip magazines. But he always knew how to rise, thanks to his quality to score goals and the magnetism with which he still conquers fans.
Costacurta, the former Milan defender has no doubts: "Ronaldo 'The Phenomenon' better than Maradona, CR7 and Messi. He is the best striker faced as an opponent: I was talking about it with a great player like Maldini, Ronaldo let us have “egg on our face” an incredible series of times. I assure you that we have marked people like Maradona, but he was absurd. You were marking him tight and he was playing deeper, you were covering the space not to give the depth and he was pointing at you in one on one, he was obsessing. All the defenders belonging to my generation, like Maldini, Nesta, Cannavaro and Ferrara, would say that the most difficult player to mark was Ronaldo the Brazilian. Before the matches I slept peacefully, except when I had to face him. He was strong but he made you look bad: he was a little asshole, he enjoyed having us defenders fall to the ground. Me too ended up sitting on the ground several times..."
"The only player who always frightened me was Ronaldo. The player par excellence of our generation, the Phenomenon. The first time I played against him was in a Brazil-Italy match played in France before the 1998 World Cup. Even going at the same pace he was able to terrify me all the time. Ronaldo was a player that you couldn't mark, but you could only limit and contain. Because, if Ronaldo wanted to score he would have scored. Of course Brazil also had Romario, Roberto Carlos, Ronaldinho. But Ronaldo was different. He was fast. He was strong. It was unbelievable. I don't think my fear of him has ever gone away. For my generation he was what Maradona or Pele were for the previous ones. He was unstoppable. At the first control he passed you, at the second he burned you, at the third he humiliated you. He looked like an extraterrestrial." Fabio Cannavaro
“He was pointing at you and stroking the ball in an unusual way that you were enchanted. But all this he did at a speed never seen before. That day, he beat me cleanly with a double step. He was going quickly to the goal and I shouted to Fabio (Cannavaro): put him down, put him down... Fabio fouled him and the referee warned him. Next action, again one on one, he stretches the ball out in speed and I couldn’t do anything but putting him down... Immediately after Fabio looked at me and said: Lilly here we end up in 9 tonight, how do we stop this guy? Ronaldo heard everything, turned to us and said in very poor Italian: sorry, I'm exaggerating. Cannavaro and I looked at each other without saying anything. With those words he made us feel small, almost impotent... This was also the Phenomenon". Lillian Thuram
“He was the best striker I’ve ever seen. He was so fast he could score from nothing and could shoot the ball better than anyone. Ronaldo was my hero, I've always liked Zidane, Ronaldinho and Rivaldo but Ronaldo is the best of all.” Leo Messi
“The most decisive player of the past twenty-five years, like Messi today. He was a sensational talent. The difference between him and me was that, even though he was also overweight, on the same Sunday I played a hallucinating match and he scored two goals. He was called the phenomenon. There must have been a reason." Antonio Cassano
“For me, Ronaldo is the greatest. He was as [good as] Pele. There was nobody like him. No one has influenced both football and the players who emerged as Ronaldo. For me he was an example of what football is. Everything he did was truly extraordinary: how he dribbled, how he ran, how he scored. He was a real "Phenomenon". What he did, I think no one else will ever be able to do, because he was natural, he wasn't "built". Ronaldo didn’t make himself, he was born for this and it is something for which you cannot be trained. Like Ronaldo, you do not become, you are born. He is truly unique.” Zlatan Ibrahimovic
"Without hesitation, Ronaldo is the best player I ever played with. He had such an ease with the ball. He is number one. Every day I trained with him, I saw something different, something new, something beautiful. That's what makes the difference between a very good player and the exception." Zinedine Zidane
“I saw Ronaldo passing a meter away from me. Generations of today don’t know what they are missing. You say Ronaldo and think of Cristiano. They don't know what Ronaldo was, the real one." Sebastian Frey
“In the history of football, there is a small number of players who have been the best of their generation. You have to choose Pele and then you have to choose Maradona, but after you have Ronaldo, not Zidane, you have to choose Ronaldo. I played for Milan when he was at Inter. The only time I saw Maldini worried was when we were playing against Ronaldo. He always said to me: 'Marcel, you have to be with me, I need your help. We have to be two people on him. If he catches the ball, he runs away and we don't take him again.' He was fantastic, a wizard. Everyone was amazed when he took the ball. The entire stadium remained in suspense. It was the first time I had seen such a thing. He was so unlucky with injuries, they probably took 70% of his potential from him. Without injuries, he could have done anything." Marcel Desailly
“The first time I saw Ronaldo playing, I spent the whole match criticizing him in vain. He shrugged to take off and threw himself into the solitary adventure of facing the defenders. Every time he touched the ball he moved it away quite a lot, too much from his feet and I, who like every spectator played my match through a third party, complained punctually: "God damn it, it's stretched too far". It seemed to go out and instead he reached it; the defender seemed to have the advantage, instead he came first; it looked like it was of the goalkeeper, instead it was a goal. The problem is that I measured his speed in human terms and Ronaldo is a physical portent who blows up all the forecasts of time and distance. Ronaldo is not a man. He is a herd.” Jorge Valdano
"He was the fastest thing I've ever seen running with the ball. Had he managed to stay free of injury, he had every chance of becoming the best footballer ever." Bobby Robson
"I play in Italy and everyone I've ever talked to there said that Ronaldo was the best player that ever played in Italy. For me he was the most complete player ever." Miroslav Klose
"He was one of the best players I've ever seen. I've never seen anyone with better movements. I would have liked to have played with him because he could have scored 2000 goals. I'd have given him the ball every time." Zico
"I think Ronaldo felt he didn't need to work as hard as us in training. He could do in two days what the rest would take 10 days to do. And usually he was right." Emerson, former team-mate
“What made him different from the others was his crazy physical strength. He was undoubtedly the best player I played with.” Luís Figo
"Ronaldo is the hardest attacker I've ever had to face. He was impossible to stop." Alessandro Nesta
“Ronaldo is an easy-K.O. boxer with Fred Astaire's feet. Every industry needs to renew its gods. With him football has a god for the next ten years." This is how the writer Manuel Vasquez Montalban called him when the phenomenon was barely twenty years old. "It is difficult to speculate what we would have seen or what would have happened if fate and bad luck had not raged in that way, but certainly he would have been a perfect car, the best Ferrari possible on the market."
“I trained Ronaldo. The real Ronaldo is the Brazilian Ronaldo.” Jose Mourinho
“The strongest opponent? Ronaldo before the injury.” Paolo Maldini
At Inter Pagliuca won a UEFA Cup in the 1997/1998 season: Zamorano, Zanetti and Ronaldo scored the goals that crashed Casiraghi and Mancini's Lazio in Paris. When asked for a comparison between "his" Ronaldo and that of today he has no doubts: "For me Ronaldo was way, way, way, way stronger than CR7".
The loves
Ronaldo was not a big heartthrob but, charismatic and millionaire, he had many women in his life. From the first girlfriend, Nádia (from the time of Cruzeiro) to the present, the model Celina Locks, the striker lived great loves. He had a brief affair with Vivi Brunieri, who took advantage of the situation and created a musical group (As Ronaldinhas), in the late 90s. Shortly afterwards, Ronaldo engaged in a long-lasting and trendy romance with model Susana Werner (today wife of goalkeeper Júlio Caesar), during the height of his career. Following, Ronaldo was enchanted by another beautiful blonde, Milene Domingues, then known as the “queen of embassies”. Months later, they got married and had a son, Ronald. Between crises and accusations of treason, the marriage lasted almost four years. Single, Ronaldo enjoyed life with several models in the days of Real Madrid until he fell in love again, this time with a brunette: Daniela Cicarelli. The passion was overwhelming, with declarations of love in public and a spectacular wedding in a castle in France. But everything collapsed in a few months, after Cicarelli had an abortion and accused Ronaldo of infidelity. The most lasting relationship was with the engineering student Bia Antony, with whom he married and had two daughters, between 2007 and 2012. Then, he still had a long romance with DJ Paula Morais.
With Nadia França, in 1995 (Eugenio Savio/VEJA)
With Viviane Brunieri, in Belo Horizonte, in 1996 (Eugenio Savio/Protegido: Estadão Conteúdo)
With Susana Werner
With the first woman, Milene, in a show by Caetano Veloso in Rio, in 2001 (Rogerio Domingues/Protegido: Estadão Conteúdo)
With Daniella Cicarelli, in Rio de Janeiro, in 2005 (Andre Durao/VEJA)
Ronaldo and Raica Oliveira, at the wedding of Kaká, in São Paulo, in 2005 (Marco Ribolli/VEJA)
With Daniella Cicarelli, in 2004 (VEJA.com/VEJA)
With Bia Antony, in 2010 (VEJA.com/VEJA)
The Ferrari of discord
A purchase of Ronaldo caused a great deal of confusion in 1999, at a time when imported cars were not yet a big fashion among footballers. He bought a Ferrari 355 F1 Berlinetta and said he was fulfilling "a child's dream".
Ronaldo and his red car paraded through the streets of Rio until he was bombarded by criticism for his exaggerated ostentation. In its June 16 edition of that year, VEJA magazine revealed an agreement between the player and the São Paulo dealership where the car came from: he obtained a 20% discount (paid 400,000 and not 500,000 reais) in exchange for disclosing Ferrari and the store in photos that went around the world. Months later, upset with the repercussions, Ronaldo got rid of the car.
Ferrari 360 Modena F1 once owned by Ronaldo was listed for sale in 2016
During his 18-year career as a professional footballer, Ronaldo Luis Nazario de Lima scored 62 goals in 98 matches for the national team of Brazil. That makes him the second-highest goalscorer after Pele, the one regarded as the greatest player of all time.
Prolific football players such as Ronaldo aren’t just good at kicking a ball around but they’re paid an obscene amount of cash to do it. Some of the dough earned by the footballer they call “the phenomenon” went on the Ferrari 360 Modena F1 you’re looking at, the first entry-level Prancing Horse to employ an all aluminum space-frame chassis.
When it was new, the 360 Modena with the electro-hydraulic automated manual transmission (hence F1) commanded $160,290 on the American market. Happily, however, the 360 Modena F1 once owned by Ronaldo costs €69,900, which is about $78,660 based on the current exchange rates. Currently located in Germany, the Ferrari shows 32,000 miles (51,500 kilometers) on the odometer. The seller also offers the warranty card that came with the car, where you’ll find Ronaldo’s name and a start date: August 5, 1999. What that means is that this car is an early model, produced in 1999, the year when the 360 Modena started to roll off the assembly line in Maranello. The listing’s description reads that the last service was performed by an authorized dealer some 1,000 kilometers ago when lots of components were renewed. Control arms, spark plugs, oil filter, timing belt, brake discs, clutch, etcetera. The rubber shoes are also new. The wheels aren’t OEM-grade, though, but Novitec Rosso NF2 19-inch alloys. The exhaust system isn’t original either, but a Tubi Style that retails for $5,120 new. Once you step inside, you’ll see that there’s a little bit of patina on the seats and that the floor mats are meh. That shouldn’t be a problem to the individual in the market for a Ferrari 360 Modena or that particular collector who has a fetish for cars previously owned by celebrities.
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