Cristiano Ronaldo broke down in 2019 during an interview with Piers Morgan for Good Morning Britain while talking about his father, José Dinis Aveiro, who died in 2005, when the footballer was just 20 years old.
“It makes me sad that I am number one and he was not able to see it. My mother, my siblings and even my eldest son have seen everything I have achieved; everyone in my family has, except my dad”.
Ronaldo’s emotion was also shaped by the complicated relationship he had with his father, who had problems with alcohol. “I never got to know my father 100%. He was an alcoholic person and I could never talk to him in a normal conversation”.
José Dinis Aveiro died at the age of 52 and did not live to see his son win the main titles and accolades of his career. For Cristiano, that was one of the great voids in his extraordinary journey.