Fact Check: Was Ronaldo’s Unveiling Event at Al-Nassr Viewed More Than 2022 World Cup Final?
Claim: A user on Twitter stated that the presentation ceremony of Cristiano Ronaldo at Al-Nassr FC was viewed more than the FIFA World Cup finals in Qatar.
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Verdict
The tweet that the presentation ceremony of Cristiano Ronaldo at Al-Nassr FC was viewed more than the FIFA World Cup finals in Qatar is misleading. No sufficient evidence or reliable source backs the claim.
Source: UGC
Full Text
Towards the tail end of 2022, Christiano Ronaldo made a career move to leave his Manchester United club for a Saudi Arabian club, Al-Nassr FC. The deal was reported to be worth millions of Euros. Since the club announced his arrival, football fans have been anticipating the unveiling of the veteran footballer at his new club.
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On Thursday, January 5, just two days after Ronaldo was unveiled at the Al-Nassr stadium, a Twitter user, Twilight (@the_marcoli_boy) claimed that Ronaldo's unveiling event had more views than the World Cup final. He went ahead to say that he is bigger than football (banter).
“Ronaldo's Al-Nassr presentation had more views than the World Cup Final. He is bigger than Football.”
While most users perceived the tweet as a harmless football talk that idolises Ronaldo’s legendary football career, the comparison to World Cup final's attracted substantial interest.
A poke through Google search to see if this is the case of an isolated claim threw up an interesting result. Around the time the tweet was made, many blogs had picked the same claim, distributing it all over the search engine. A look at a few of them pointed towards another account of an acclaimed journalist, Pedro Sepúlveda.
Source: Twitter
His tweet, which was made a few hours after @the_marcoli_boy's post, tagged the official handle of FIFA World Cup as a show of confidence in the statement.
The tweet attracted diverse opinions; while some users still seem to believe the claim, others expressed their skepticism. A Twitter user, @Rose31999202 described Ronaldo as a king deserving the attention.
“It's a CR7 effect. We love our King," she said.
Source: Twitter
Verification
In his post, DUBAWA noticed that the claimant never mentioned the names of the 40 channels that screened the said presentation. He also did not define the channels to know if they were TV stations or YouTube channels, making his post a conjecture at best.
Nonetheless, a report by Trenddetail mentioned that five channels (Saudi sports, 1SSC Saudi sports channels, Bein Sport news channel, Abu Dhabi Sports Channel, Sport TV Portuguese channel) would telecast the presentation but still there was no tally to the number of viewers.
El-Nassr's video of the presentation on its YouTube channel had less than 50,000 views as at the time this report was filed.
Source: UGC
The world's population according to the UN is 8 billion. To say three billion watched Ronaldo's debut would mean more than 37% of the world's population were connected. There is no evidence to back this.
Although FIFA is yet to release the official figure of viewers who tuned into the 2022 World Cup final, a report showed that BBC streaming service alone had 10 million views of the final. In 2018, 1.12 billion people watched the final match between France and Croatia. With the hype around the Qatar campaign being a better edition in terms of engagement, the viewers' participation in 2022 may be slightly higher.
Additionally, there was no report from any credible media about this unprecedented phenomenon. This is very unusual considering the media attention Ronaldo has amassed since announcing his intentions to join the Saudi Arabian Club.
Conclusion
There is no sufficient evidence or reliable source backing the claim that Ronaldo’s unveiling at his new club, Al-Nassr had more views than the 2022 world cup finals in Qatar. This tweet is misleading.
The researcher produced this fact-check per the Dubawa 2023 Kwame KariKari Fellowship partnership with Legit.ng to facilitate the ethos of “truth” in journalism and enhance media literacy in the country.
Man who looked like Pogba
Meanwhile, Legit.ng earlier reported that a young Nigerian man who always prides himself as Pogba's lookalike got his dream fulfilled.
On his TikTok page, he often tries out the footballer's skills. After fashioning an online image off the success of the Juventus player, he was finally recognised by him and Adidas.
In a short video he shared online on Monday, September 26, the man got a delivery of a big box sent from Pogba and the sports kit company.
Source: Legit.ng
