Statue of Footballer Cristiano Ronaldo Installed in Goa’s Panaji

CR-7 statue was being made for the last 3 years

Cristiano Ronaldo’s statue has been installed in Goa’s Panaji to inspire youth and take football to the next level in the state and country.

The statue weighs around 410 kg’s and the aim of installing it is to motivate the youngsters to take up sports and follow their dreams.

“This is for the first time that the statue of Cristiano Ronaldo has come up in India. This is nothing but to inspire our youth. If you want to take football to another level, then this is what young boys and girls will look forward to, taking selfies and looking at the statue and getting inspired to play," Goa minister Micheal Lobo told ANI.

"The statue is just to inspire. We want good infrastructure from the government. We need coaches who can train our boys and girls. Government should appoint former players as coaches, who played for Goa and made India proud. In this way only, we can move ahead in the field of sports. Being such a big country, we are far behind many countries in terms of football," he added.

The minister further said that there are certain people who are opposing the installation of the statue and they are the ones who don't want to see the country going ahead in sports.

The statue costs around 12 lakhs and it was being made for the last three years but got delayed because of the pandemic.

CR-7 is currently playing for Manchester United. Ronaldo is very popular among Indian football fans. The footballer has a massive fan following of 315.81 million on Instagram.

In 2016, his hometown chose to honor him by renaming the Madeira International Airport as Cristiano Ronaldo International Airport.