Juventus season tickets sold out for Cristiano Ronaldo

World
Europe

Serie A’s Juventus announced on Thursday that all season tickets for the team’s home matches in the coming 2018-19 campaign have been sold out, creating another business success for the “Old Lady” (one of the nick names of Juventus) since the arrival of Cristiano Ronaldo.

“The desire for fans to see their Bianconeri heroes at the Allianz Stadium this season is sky-high. This has been demonstrated by the goal achieved by the season ticket campaign for the coming season, which has already sold out,” said the club in a statement on their website.

Juventus has 41,597 seats at the Allianz Stadium. The club said that so far 25,300 season tickets have been sold, in addition to the 4,000 ones held by premium members, leaving only 12,207 seats to be filled. It is almost foreseeable how crowded and vigorous the Allianz Stadium will be in the new campaign.

Juventus fans are crazy for Cristiano Ronaldo's arrival. /VCG Photo

This was not the first “CR7 effect” on Juventus. Multiple media outlets have reported that in the 24 hours after Ronaldo’s transfer, some 520,000 Juventus jerseys have been sold, leading to a sales revenue of over 60 million US dollars. Though it’s a lot of money, according to CNBC, Juventus can only get a share of 10-15 percent, which is six-nine million US dollars.

Ronaldo has been dealing with a tax dispute in Spain for a while. Daily Mail reported on Friday that the Portuguese superstar paid some 15.8 million US dollars to Spanish tax authorities and accepted a two-year suspended sentence.

According to Spanish radio station Cadena Cope, Ronaldo has also paid another 6.17 million US dollars in legal costs. He will not serve a prison sentence because in Spain, first offences for administrative crimes involving terms of two years or less are not custodial.

Both Lionel Messi (L) and Ronaldo (R) have suffered from tax issues in Spain. /VCG Photo

The tax dispute has been puzzling Ronaldo for years as he was accused of failing to pay 17.1 million US dollars in taxes between 2011 and 2014 by Spain’s treasury. Even after he moved to Juventus, Jose Maria Mollinedo, spokesman for the Spanish finance ministry warned that “Juventus signing Ronaldo will not change his problems with the Treasury, even in Italy a warrant for his arrest could be activated”.

Ronaldo’s not the only soccer superstar suffering from tax issues. In 2016, Lionel Messi and his father were found guilty of tax fraud in Barcelona. However, in 2017, the prison sentences were replaced with extra fines. According to ESPN, La Liga’s president Javier Tebas believes that the country’s high tax rate played a role in making Ronaldo leave the league for Italy.

“His departure to Italy favors him because he will earn more money than here. From an international view, in Spain we have a problem that we can't compete from a fiscal standpoint. We have to work on this because having this fiscal situation penalises us and prevents us from growing as a competition,” said Tebas to Marca TV.