Brazilian Fútbol Legend Ronaldo Announces Retirement

By Sharmaine Jones

Ronaldo Nazario de Lima has scored his last goal. The Brazilian legend held a press conference Wednesday announcing his retirement from the game he loves.

"As you can imagine and you heard during the whole weekend, I'm here today to [confirm that] I'm closing my career as a professional player,'' Ronaldo said, with sons Alex and Ronald by his side.

The 34-year old striker's impressive 18-year career included three FIFA Player of the Year awards and two World Cup victories. He also holds the World Cup scoring record. Ronaldo said he decided to hang up his cleats because of an aging body and hypothyroidism, a condition that causes fatigue and muscle pain, thus preventing him from performing at his best.

"It's very hard to leave something that made me so happy," Ronaldo told ABC News. "Mentally, I wanted to continue, but I have to acknowledge that I lost [the fight] to my body.”

Ronaldo captivated fans when playing for FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, AC Milan and Inter Milan, scoring 326 goals in 466 games. And how could we forget the two goals he scored in Brazil's 2-0 victory over Germany in the 2002 World Cup final. Yes, soccer fans will mourn Ronaldo's departure from the game, but we may never fully understand the difficulty of his decision.

“With this announcement,” he said, “it feels like it's my first death.”

The decision to retire comes on the heels of the Corinthians' 2-0 loss to Deportes Tolima earlier this month. Fans blamed Ronaldo for the loss, which eliminated the Brazilian team from the preliminary round of Copa Libertadores.

“I want to publicly apologize for failing in the Libertadores project,” he said, according to USA Today. “My career was beautiful, was wonderful, I've had many defeats but infinite victories.”

Indeed.

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Tags futbol, retire, Ronaldo, Ronaldo Nazario de Lima, Soccer, Sports Illustrated, World Cup