About Cristiano Ronaldo - Professional Footballer

About Cristiano Ronaldo Portuguese professional footballer soccer player

Cristiano Ronaldo is a Portuguese professional footballer soccer player who has set records while playing for both Manchester United and Real Madrid.

Ronaldo was born in São Pedro, Funchal, and grew up in the Funchal parish of Santo António, as the youngest child of Maria Dolores dos Santos Aveiro, a cook, and José Dinis Aveiro, a municipal gardener and a part-time kit man. His second given name, "Ronaldo", was chosen after then U.S. He has one older brother, Hugo, and two older sisters, Elma and Liliana Cátia. His great-grandmother on his father's side, Isabel da Piedade, was from São Vicente, Cape Verde. Ronaldo grew up in a Catholic and impoverished home, sharing a room with his brother and sisters.

As a child, Ronaldo played for amateur team Andorinha from 1992 to 1995,where his father was the kit man, and later spent two years with Nacional. In 1997, aged 12, he went on a three day trial with Sporting CP, who signed him for a fee of £1,500. He subsequently moved from Madeira to Alcochete, near Lisbon, to join Sporting's other youth players at the club's football academy. By age 14, Ronaldo believed he had the ability to play semi-professionally, and agreed with his mother to cease his education in order to focus entirely on football. While popular with other students at school, he had been expelled after throwing a chair at his teacher, who he said had "disrespected" him. However, one year later, he was diagnosed with a racing heart, a condition that could have forced him to give up playing football. He underwent an operation in which a laser was used to cauterise the affected area of his heart; discharged from hospital hours after the procedure, he resumed training only a few days later.