The grimace said it all: Cristiano Ronaldo’s game was up.
Regardless of what you think of the man, the fact his Euro 2016 final lasted just 24 minutes was a crying shame. Literally, in his case.
Although he would eventually leave the field on a stretcher eight minutes later, it was the moment the camera lens homed in on the Portuguese number seven’s tear-streaked face that confirmed that the Real Madrid star wouldn’t make it to half-time. At that precise moment, a moth – one of thousands that had gathered in the Stade de France in the hours before kickoff – landed on his face.
While the majority of viewers’ initial reaction to Ronaldo’s premature exit from the game was one of disappointment and sympathy for the great man, a good number of others were more concerned with the moth that had settled on the injured star’s face.
Predictably, even before Ronaldo left the pitch on a stretcher, some had set up Twitter accounts in honour of the drably-coloured insect.
https://twitter.com/alansmith90/status/752221759370395648
It really didn’t take long, did it?
