Ronaldo Says This Season Is Likely His Last — Just Days After Marrying Georgina Rodriguez
Cristiano Ronaldo has said this season is probably his last as a footballer, choosing the week of his wedding to make the announcement that has been building for months.
The 41-year-old married his partner Georgina Rodriguez on Tuesday and then spoke to Vogue magazine about the future. "This is probably my last year of football, and I want to leave a spectacular legacy," Ronaldo told the publication, in an interview published on Sunday 16 August (BBC Sport; Yahoo Sports).
The signal is not entirely new. In November 2025, Ronaldo said he would retire "soon" to spend more time with his family (Reuters). Days later he clarified that "soon" meant "one or two years" (Reuters). In July, he said he would decide "with a calm head" whether the 2026 World Cup — which would be his sixth — would be his last, in conversation with his family (BBC Sport). The Vogue interview tightens that timeline further, pointing to the end of the upcoming season rather than an open-ended horizon.
Ronaldo is in the final year of his contract at Al-Nassr, the Saudi Pro League champions he joined in December 2022. He has spent almost four years at the club, having extended his deal until 2027 in June 2025. His former Al-Nassr coach, Jorge Jesus, who guided the club to the Saudi Pro League title last season, was appointed Portugal head coach in July following the national team's World Cup exit (Reuters).
The numbers behind any retirement are staggering. Ronaldo is a five-time Ballon d'Or winner (the award for the world's best player) and a five-time Champions League winner. He has won league titles in four countries — England with Manchester United, Spain with Real Madrid, Italy with Juventus, and Saudi Arabia with Al-Nassr. He is the all-time top goalscorer in men's international football. And he sits 24 goals short of 1,000 senior career goals, a figure no player in the history of the men's game has reached (BBC Sport).
Whether he chases that milestone down before hanging up his boots is one of the season's most compelling subplots. Twenty-four goals in a single campaign is well within reach for a player who has averaged roughly a goal every other game across his time in Saudi Arabia. But Ronaldo has also said he wants to leave a legacy, and the numbers are only part of it.
For football fans, there is something quietly surreal about this moment. The player who has defined an era alongside Lionel Messi — who himself recently said he was unsure how much longer he would continue (BBC Sport) — is now openly talking about the final curtain. Both of them, fading out at once, would close a chapter the sport will not easily replace.
Nothing is confirmed beyond "probably." Ronaldo has walked back timelines before. But a wedding, a Vogue interview, and the words "last year" feel different from earlier hints. The countdown, it seems, has genuinely begun.
