Ronaldo hysteria grips fans in Turin
City celebrates after Juventus signs Portugal star
An ice cream flavour in his honour, a pizza named after him, queues to buy his shirt: For some, Cristiano Ronaldo is as important as the Pope.
Juventus created shock waves across the world Tuesday when it completed the signing of Ronaldo from Real Madrid for a Serie A record of US$130 million. The fivetime Ballon d’Or winner signed a four-year deal with the Italian champions.
And Ronaldo mania is in full swing in Turin, with enterprising businessmen not missing the opportunity to celebrate the occasion and cash in on the arrival of the Portugal forward.
Leonardo La Porta, who has owned Gelateria Miretti in the heart of Turin for 30 years, has created a flavour called CR7 — Ronaldo’s famous brand name.
The 50-year-old La Porta isn’t a Juventus supporter, nor even a soccer fan, but has often created flavours to mark important events in the city. However, he has created only one flavour in honour of a person before, when the Pope came to Turin in 2015.
La Porta put a lot of thought into creating the CR7 flavour, which he wanted to represent a union between Portugal and Turin.
“I put it on sale on the date 7/7 because it was the day it was rumoured Cristiano Ronaldo would be presented,” La Porta told The Associated Press. “I thought of it a week before, the research was quite intense.
“We chose to use a typical Portuguese liquor which is the Ginja, it is a sour cherry liquor which strongly links Portugal to the Piedmont region, because here too in Piedmont we have a similar cherry liquor. In Portugal, this liquor is served in a chocolate cup, so this ice cream is made up of milk, cream, sugar and carob flour, with this Ginja liquor and pieces of chocolate.”
The taste is rich and flavourful, with hints of spice and fruit.
“I hope (Ronaldo) can come here to try it,” said La Porta, adding the flavour regularly sells out.
“If not, I’m ready to go to his house to make it for him. We’ll see.”
Juventus has won the league for the past seven years, and the Italian Cup the past four, but hasn’t lifted the Champions League since 1996, although it has finished runner-up in two of the past four campaigns.
Shirts bearing Ronaldo’s name have been flying off the shelves, and not just in Turin. The official Juventus store in Milan has sold a shirt a minute.
Stores are also running out of letters to print Ronaldo’s name, while the shop nearest the stadium reportedly ran out of the actual shirt on Wednesday night as the city gears up to welcome the man himself, at his presentation on Monday.
Ronaldo should also find it easy to settle into life in Turin. Although it has less than a third of Madrid’s population, Turin is still Italy’s fourth-largest city, within easy reach of the mountains and the sea.
“I think he will like it here,” said Simone Massucco, a 17-year-old student from Turin, who was buying his first Juventus shirt — emblazoned with the Ronaldo name. “It’s not a city where the fans hassle you too much. I think he’ll settle in well.”