The buyer of one of Cristiano Ronaldo’s five Ballon d’Or trophies has been revealed as the Israel’s richest man.
The 2013 highly coveted trophy was sold to the wealthiest man in Israel via a charity auction in London in 2017 for €600,000.
Ronaldo, who recently joined Al Nassr, won the top individual prize on five occasions, first in 2008 while still on the books of Manchester United and four times as a Real Madrid player.
The 2013 contest was one of the more tightly-fought, with the Portugal star pipping Lionel Messi and Franck Ribery to top honours.
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After the ceremony, Ronaldo opted to donate the award to charity. It was ultimately auctioned off to raise funds for the Make-A-Wish foundation, and the Israel’s richest man, Idan Ofer, had the winning bid of €600,000, Mirror reports.
According to reports at the time from Marca, Ronaldo specifically asked for an extra replica of his 2013 award to be auctioned for charity, with ESPN reporting the real award remained on display at his museum in Madeira. The six-figure sum went straight to the children’s charity, which grants wishes to children affected by critical illness.
A number of other items were also auctioned off at the event in London. These included a meet-and-greet with Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola and Manchester United’s then-manager Jose Mourinho, which fetched €30,000.
Ofer, who came up with the winning bid for Ronaldo’s trophy, is worth a reported US$9.9bn (£8.1bn) according to Forbes. He has stakes in two football clubs, investing in Atletico Madrid later in 2017 and later taking over as majority owner of Portuguese side Famalicao.
Ronaldo himself was not in attendance at the auction. Instead it was the responsibility of Jorge Mendes, his agent at the time, to hand Ofer his prize.
The forward won the Ballon d’Or in 2013 after a season in which he scored 55 goals in as many games for Real Madrid but ended up empty-handed with Bayern Munich winning the Champions League and Barcelona romping to the title in Spain.
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