The Goal Standard - Cristiano Ronaldo

- Max Rivlin-Nadler, photos by Serge Leblon

Cristiano Ronaldo dos Santos Aveiro wakes up every day in a compound of a home in Madrid. A Mercedes, a Bentley, a Lamborghini, and a Rolls-Royce are parked outside.

A closet of designer shirts are ready to accentuate his perfectly toned figure. A private jet sits on standby. And he tells himself something that would sound pompous if it weren’t, well, completely true: “I’m the best,” he says to Maxim a few days after he’s won his fourth Golden Shoe, the award for the most prolific goal scorer in Europe. “That I am the best is why I continue to improve. This is why I achieve so many great things.”

The world knows him simply as Ronaldo, who wears #7 for Real Madrid. Ronaldo is everything that personifies a great soccer player - electric, quick, ruthless, and decisive. When he strikes, it can be from any angle, in almost any situation. It’s not surprising to see him turn a ball sailing out of bounds into a miracle goal.