Cristiano Ronaldo would be 36 goals away from his thousandth goal with unofficial games
Counting pre-season friendlies and matches for youth and Olympic teams, disregarded as official games, the star would have scored 964 goals
With 900 goals scored in official matches , Cristiano Ronaldo is now facing another challenge in his successful career: reaching his 1,000th goal. Is that far away? Maybe not. ge researched all the goals scored by the Portuguese star in matches that would normally be accepted in Brazil, but are not considered official in the statistics used abroad – club friendlies and games for youth/Olympic teams. This survey shows that CR7 may be just 36 goals away from the 1,000th goal, depending on the criteria adopted.
Cristiano Ronaldo may not be worried about including his “unofficial goals” in the race for the thousandth. But, if he ever needs to, he can use the math done by ge : today, in addition to the 900 already counted, the 39-year-old striker has scored 46 in friendlies for clubs and 18 for youth and Olympic teams. Total: 964 goals. In the parallel count, he would be just 36 short of the historic mark, but the number, as in any survey of this nature, can vary according to each personal criteria:
Check out the possible counts of CR7’s goals (and choose yours):
Official games only: 900 (see infographic of goals at the end of the report)
Official matches + friendly matches between professional teams: 940
Official matches + friendly matches of any kind: 946
Official matches + friendly matches between professional teams + youth/Olympic national team matches: 958
Official matches + friendly matches of any kind + youth/Olympic national team matches: 964
The European standard for counting goals only considers competitive matches, in the case of clubs, and also accepts friendly matches between adult teams. Even state championship matches, which are official games in Brazil but are not part of the sporting culture of most countries, are ignored in many goal counts.
This difference in criteria is at the heart of any discussion about, for example, Pelé’s goals – 1,283 counting all games, but 767 in most statistics from outside Brazil . Another striker who surpassed the 1,000-goal mark, Romário, also had his tally marked by controversy.
Therefore, following the pattern he has always known, Cristiano Ronaldo does not even mention the possibility of including “unofficial” goals. The Al-Nassr star even joked, upon reaching 900 goals, about the veracity of the milestone, saying that he could prove his goals because “they all have videos”.
By ignoring the “other goals” (many of which were recorded on video, by the way), CR7 avoids controversy. After all, like all goal tallies, whether past or present, even Cristiano Ronaldo’s friendlies, played in the 21st century and extensively documented, would also have their asterisks. Of the 46 goals he scored in games of this type, 40 were against other professional teams, but the other six, however, were against B teams or combined.
2006/07 Season – Manchester United 4 x 3 Europe Combined – 1 goal
Season 2010/11 – Combined Murcia 2 x 2 Real Madrid – 1 goal
2011/12 Season – Kuwait National Team 0 x 2 Real Madrid – 1 goal
2018/19 season – Juventus 5 x 0 Juventus B – 1 goal
2022/23 Season – Al-Nassr/Al-Hilal 4 x 5 PSG Combined – 2 goals
Check out CR7’s goals in friendlies, by club:
Sporting – 3 gols
Manchester United – 12 gols
Real Madrid – 25 goals
Juventus – 4 goals
Al-Nassr – 2 goals
And the goals for Portugal’s youth and Olympic teams:
U-15 – 7 goals
U-17 – 5 goals
Under-20 – 1 goal
U21 – 3 goals
Olympic team (under-23) – 2 goals
