CELEBRITY
Cristiano Ronaldo named most powerful player on Instagram at 2022 World Cup
Cristiano Ronaldo leads Lionel Messi, Neymar and Kylian Mbappe as the most influential footballer on Instagram due to play at the 2022 World Cup.
Portugal forward Ronaldo had a 48% increase in followers in the past year.
He averages more than $3.5m in media value per post, according to analysts Nielsen Gracenote.
Manchester United team-mate Jadon Sancho is the most influential English player, while Gavi is the breakthrough star with a 5,165% growth in followers.
Rankings are based on Nielsen’s influencer measurement tool, which evaluates total followers, follower growth, engagement rate and average brand value per post on Instagram to give a media value total.
It ranked the players who are expected to feature at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.
Ronaldo has 480 million followers on Instagram, while Argentina’s Messi is followed by 360 million people – a 38% growth in the past 12 months – and produces $2.6m of media value per post.
The Paris St-Germain attacking trio of Messi, Neymar and Mbappe rank second, third and fourth respectively behind Ronaldo, each averaging more than $1m per post.
Of the top 10, Brazil’s Vinicius Junior had the biggest growth in following of any player with a 90% increase, having scored the winner in the Champions League final for Real Madrid against Liverpool.
France’s N’Golo Kante ranks eighth in the list and has the highest engagement rate of any player in the top 10 with his posts, at 11%.
The next big social media star looks to be Spain’s Gavi, whose following has shot up by more than 5000% to 6.2 million. His posts have an engagement rate of nearly 30%.
Brazil’s Raphinha and Antony are second and third in the breakthrough footballer standings with huge growth in their follower numbers after summer moves to Barcelona and Manchester United respectively.
Meanwhile, France are likely to be the most influential team on social media at the 2022 World Cup, with 11.7 million followers on their official page.
This edges out Brazil and Portugal, who have 11.3 million and 10.3 million respectively. Notably, 86% of Portugal’s followers live outside the European country.
England are fourth with 8.5m followers. Of their players, winger Sancho is the most influential – he has 8.9 million followers, an increase in 21% over the past year, while he has a healthy 8% engagement rate on posts.
Several young English players have had notable breakthroughs on social media, including Jack Grealish who now has more than five million followers, and Aaron Ramsdale, whose following has exploded by a remarkable 920% over the past 12 months after joining Arsenal.
Top 10 most influential footballers on Instagram at 2022 World Cup Player Country Club Handle Followers (m) Value per post Cristiano Ronaldo Portugal Man Utd cristiano 480 $3,585,218 Lionel Messi Argentina PSG leomessi 360 $2,631,388 Neymar Brazil PSG neymarjr 178 $1,152,495 Kylian Mbappe France PSG k.mbappe 72.5 $1,173,157 Vinicius Junior Brazil Real Madrid vinijr 23 $685,120 Karim Benzema France Real Madrid karimbenzema 58 $489,239 Paulo Dybala Argentina Roma paulodybala 49 $491,547 N’Golo Kante France Chelsea nglkante 14 $525,178 Paul Pogba France Juventus paulpogba 55 $407,542 Sergio Ramos Spain PSG sergioramos 53 $368,639
Top 10 breakthrough footballers on Instagram Player Country Club Handle Followers (m) Value per post Gavi Spain Barcelona pablogavi 6.2 $377,305 Raphinha Brazil Barcelona raphinha 3 $22,727 Antony Brazil Man Utd antony00 4.8 $106,229 Pedri Spain Barcelona pedri 7.3 $255,212 Rodrigo de Paul Argentina Atletico Madrid rodridepaul 5 $206,983 Rodrygo Brazil Real Madrid rodrygogoes 7.5 $119,726 Aurelien Tchouameni France Real Madrid aurelientchm17 2.1 $80,973 Achraf Hakimi Morocco PSG achrafhakimi 10.1 $133,187 Dusan Vlahovic Serbia Juventus vlahovicdusan 1.7 $118,691 Darwin Nunez Uruguay Liverpool darwin_n9 2.1 $14,527 Top 10 most popular men’s national teams on Instagram Country Handle Followers (m) % fans outside country France equipedefrance 11.7 64.85 Brazil cbf_futebol 11.5 35.73 Portugal portugal 10.4 86.41 England england 8.5 79.47 Argentina afaseleccion 7.3 54.75 Mexico miseleccionmx 5.9 47.46 Germany dfb_team 4.9 72.84 Spain sefutbol 4 75.71 Morocco equipedumaroc 1.5 33.66 Netherlands onsoranje 1.3 72.67
-BBC
Former England soccer captain David Beckham and actor Gary Oldman were knighted in King Charles’ annual birthday honours list on Saturday, while sculptor Antony Gormley was made a Companion of Honour.
Beckham, 50, joined Manchester United as a trainee in 1993, going on to make almost 400 appearances for the club where he won a string of titles and cups.
He subsequently played for Real Madrid, LA Galaxy, and Inter Milan, as well as captaining his country 58 times and making 115 appearances.
His marriage to fashion designer and former Spice Girl Victoria Beckham in 1999 cemented a celebrity status which went far beyond his sporting exploits.
Oldman, 67, started his career on the stage, where he was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, before rising to prominence in film. He won the best actor Oscar for playing Winston Churchill in the 2017 drama “Darkest Hour”.
He also had roles in the “Dark Knight Trilogy” and the “Harry Potter” movie series and more recently starred in the TV spy drama “Slow Horses”.
Other famous names receiving honours included damehoods for musical theatre star Elaine Paige, novelist Pat Barker and ceramics maker Emma Bridgewater.
Roger Daltrey, lead singer of rock band the Who and a patron of the Teenage Cancer Trust, received a knighthood for services to charity.
More than 1,200 people received honours for their achievements, with a particular focus on those who had given their time to public service, the government said.
King Charles’ official birthday will be celebrated with the annual “Trooping the Colour” military parade in London on Saturday. His actual birthday is on November 14
-Reuters
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One of three judges in Diego Maradona’s closely scrutinized homicide trial in Argentina resigned on Tuesday amid a scandal triggered by the alleged filming of an unauthorised documentary, bringing uncertainty to the future of legal proceedings.
The high-profile trial over the death of soccer star Maradona began on March 11 in the South American country where the World Cup winner is still revered.
-Reuters
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For the third year in a row, and the fifth time overall, Cristiano Ronaldo is the world’s highest-paid athlete.
But at age 40, the Portuguese soccer superstar is reaching new highs.
Over the past 12 months, counting both his playing salary at Saudi Arabia’s Al-Nassr and his off-field business endeavors, Ronaldo collected an estimated $275 million before taxes and agent fees—the third-best year by an active athlete ever measured by Forbes.
On that all-time list, Ronaldo is surpassed only by boxer Floyd Mayweather, who earned $300 million in 2015 and $285 million in 2018.
And when it comes to the 2025 leaderboard, Ronaldo has a $119 million advantage over No. 2, Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry.
The League of Wealthy Sportsmen
The gap is especially impressive considering that Curry’s $156 million total is also a record for his sport, beating the NBA mark of $128.2 million set last year by LeBron James.
And there are plenty of other eye-popping paydays among this year’s 10 highest-paid athletes, starting with James, who notched a personal-best $133.8 million to land at No. 6. Meanwhile, Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott (No. 4, $137million) and New York Mets outfielder Juan Soto (No. 7, $114 million) broke records for the NFL and MLB.
Combined, the 10 highest-paid athletes brought in $1.4 billion, up slightly from last year’s $1.38 billion and the largest total since Forbes began ranking athlete earnings in 1990.
This year is also only the second time, after 2024, that every member of the top 10 made at least $100 million.
In fact, heavyweight boxing champion Oleksandr Usyk ($101 million) and golfer Jon Rahm ($100 million) reached the milestone, too, without managing to crack this list.
For the third year in a row, and the fifth time overall, Cristiano Ronaldo is the world’s highest-paid athlete.
But at age 40, the Portuguese soccer superstar is reaching new highs.
Over the past 12 months, counting both his playing salary at Saudi Arabia’s Al-Nassr and his off-field business endeavors, Ronaldo collected an estimated $275 million before taxes and agent fees—the third-best year by an active athlete ever measured by Forbes.
On that all-time list, Ronaldo is surpassed only by boxer Floyd Mayweather, who earned $300 million in 2015 and $285 million in 2018.
And when it comes to the 2025 leaderboard, Ronaldo has a $119 million advantage over No. 2, Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry.
The gap is especially impressive considering that Curry’s $156 million total is also a record for his sport, beating the NBA mark of $128.2 million set last year by LeBron James.
And there are plenty of other eye-popping paydays among this year’s 10 highest-paid athletes, starting with James, who notched a personal-best $133.8 million to land at No. 6. Meanwhile, Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott (No. 4, $137million) and New York Mets outfielder Juan Soto (No. 7, $114 million) broke records for the NFL and MLB.
Combined, the 10 highest-paid athletes brought in $1.4 billion, up slightly from last year’s $1.38 billion and the largest total since Forbes began ranking athlete earnings in 1990.
This year is also only the second time, after 2024, that every member of the top 10 made at least $100 million.
In fact, heavyweight boxing champion Oleksandr Usyk ($101 million) and golfer Jon Rahm ($100 million) reached the milestone, too, without managing to crack this list.
World’s Highest-Paid Athletes 2025
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