Yet as time passes and his career becomes nothing more than a collection of YouTube videos set to appalling house music, and his deeds are crunched into numbers that are trotted out by people who prefer to lionise raw data over raw talent, we have missed the point. We can talk rabidly about the time he scored a hat-trick at Old Trafford and was serenaded with a standing ovation and we can easily recall his outrageous double-dummy that won Inter the UEFA Cup. That goal for Barcelona, his seizure on the morning of the 1998 World Cup final and resulting horror-show of a performance, the glorious redemption in the Land of the Rising Sun four years later. Of course, we all remember the big moments.

The greatest striker of the modern era who won three FIFA World Player of the Year awards, a brace of Ballon D’Ors, and scored over 400 career goals.

The bastard offspring of a beaver and a hollow point bullet who smiled at defenders before turning them to jelly. The footballer who made Sir Bobby Robson dance like your Dad at a wedding after too many Pernod and blacks. The kid who burst out of Bento Riberio and blazed a swoosh-shaped trail across Europe. Otherwise known as O Fenomeno, Originaldo and, to some heathens, Fat Ronaldo. The man, of course, was Ronaldo Luis Nazario de Lima. His fans, though, didn’t give a toss: they only cared that he was recovering from knee surgery and, all being well, would soon don club colours in his homeland.

In April 2008, a man was reported to the Rio de Janeiro police for threatening three prostitutes.Īlthough the case was later dropped when it appeared he’d been a victim of extortion, the escapade cost him $4.8 million in lost endorsements, led to a temporary break in his engagement to his long-term partner and saw him savagely criticised and satirised by the Brazilian media.

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