Cristiano Ronaldo retires from Portugal duty to continue club career with Al‑Nassr
Cristiano Ronaldo announced on 5 November 2026 that he has ended his international career with Portugal and will continue playing for Al‑Nassr; the 41-year-old said his main target now is to reach 1,000 career goals, having scored 985 to date.
Ronaldo's professional path has included spells at Sporting, Manchester United, Real Madrid and Juventus, with one season in Sporting's first team where he played 31 first-team games and scored five goals. He caught Manchester United's attention in a 2003 pre-season friendly in Lisbon, setting up two goals in a 3-1 win, and joined United five days later for £12m. "After we played Sporting the lads in the dressing room talked about him constantly, and on the plane back from the game they urged me to sign him - that's how highly they rated him," said Sir Alex Ferguson, adding: "He is one of the most exciting young players I've ever seen."
In his first spell at Manchester United, Ronaldo scored 118 goals in 292 games and won the FA Cup in his first season, scoring in the final against Millwall. His 2006-07 campaign produced 17 Premier League goals, the PFA Player of the Year and Young Player of the Year awards, and his first league title. The following season he scored in the Champions League final, won his first European Golden Shoe and claimed another league title.
Ronaldo moved to Real Madrid months after his long-range strike against Porto — a goal that won the inaugural Fifa Puskas award — and his second season at Real produced a Copa del Rey, in which he scored the extra-time winner in El Clasico, rising at the far post to head in Angel di Maria's cross. In October 2015 he scored in a 3-0 La Liga win over Levante to become Real's all-time top scorer with his 324th goal in 310 games, and he left the club with 450 goals in 438 games after extending a run that had produced 50 or more goals in six consecutive seasons.
Ronaldo's Champions League record includes becoming the first player to score 100 goals in the competition with a hat-trick in the 2016-17 quarter-final second leg win over Bayern Munich; only Lionel Messi and Robert Lewandowski have since reached 100. He finished with 141 goals in 187 Champions League appearances and was the tournament's top scorer or joint top scorer for six seasons in a row. In 2018 he produced an acrobatic bicycle-kick winner against Juventus that earned applause from the home fans; "That is one of the great goals you will see… I was going to say Champions League football, but, basically, football," said Pat Nevin on BBC Radio 5 Live.
On the international stage, Ronaldo was part of Portugal's European Championship triumph in 2016, when they beat hosts France 1-0 in the final in Paris; he went off injured in the first half and took on an unofficial coaching role, and was named in the team of the tournament after three goals and three assists. He became the all-time top scorer at the European Championship with 14 goals and added key international milestones thereafter, including two late headers in a 2021 World Cup qualifying win over the Republic of Ireland that moved him to 111 international goals. He finished his Portugal career with 146 goals in 234 caps, a figure the article describes as a record for international appearances.
Ronaldo reached further career landmarks later on, becoming the first professional player to score 900 top-level career goals as Portugal beat Croatia in 2024, and accumulating club totals reported as five for Sporting, 145 for Manchester United, 450 for Real Madrid, 101 for Juventus, 138 for Al‑Nassr and 146 for Portugal. He has won five Ballons d'Or — equalling Lionel Messi at the time — although the article notes Messi later won three more to lead 8-5. Ronaldo also became the first player to win five Champions League titles, adding to his 2008 win with United with victories in 2014, 2016, 2017 and 2018 with Real Madrid; since his departure, former Real teammates Toni Kroos, Dani Carvajal, Luka Modric and Nacho have gone on to win six.
Ronaldo's retirement from Portugal duty leaves his club career at Al‑Nassr as the confirmed focus and the stated objective of reaching 1,000 career goals remains his immediate aim, with the article noting he is 15 goals short of that mark.
