The thing about Cristiano Ronaldo is that whether you love him or hate him, you can’t look away. To an average fan, he represents the absolute limit of what a human being can achieve through sheer willpower.

Most of us struggle to hit the gym twice a week, but Ronaldo has spent over twenty years treating his body like a temple. Even at 41, he’s still out there playing for Portugal with the same psychotic hunger he had as a teenager. While Messi always felt like a natural-born alien genius, Ronaldo felt like the ultimate self-made machine. He proved that if you outwork everyone else, you can conquer the world anyway.

Sure, the dramatic sighs and the massive ego can be annoying. Sometimes you just want to tell him to chill out. But deep down, you have to respect the obsession. He refused to accept being ordinary, and football is going to feel incredibly empty whenever he finally decides to hang up his boots.