Cristiano Ronaldo and Juventus continue to gain Instagram followers despite rape allegations
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CRISTIANO Ronaldo's massive social media appeal has continued to rocket, despite allegations accusing him of rape.
The Juventus superstar vehemently denies the allegations made by Kathryn Mayorga that he raped her in a Las Vegas hotel room in June 2009, calling them "fake news".
Cristiano Ronaldo continues to transform Juventus as a brand despite rape allegations
Two of his sponsors Nike and EA Sports issued public statements on the back of the sexual assault claims.
Nike said it was “deeply concerned” by “disturbing” allegations it said it would monitor closely.
EA Sport also described the situation as “concerning”.
However, Ronaldo's popularity has continued to grow even faster on social media.
Just weeks after Mayorga's allegations, Ronaldo overtook pop star Selena Gomez as the most popular celebrity on Instagram.
In fact, CR7 and Juventus are continuing to grow on social media, Instagram specifically, where Ronaldo is the most followed celebrity.
After the claims were made Ronaldo and the Turin club enjoyed their biggest growth since he left Real Madrid in the months of November and December.
According to figures from on Instagram, Ronaldo has gained 13,004,343 more followers since the court papers were filed.
While Juventus have made 6,132,426 more fans.
Here's the numbers...
On Instagram, the Portugal forward is king.
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Ronaldo still continues to pull in around 140,000 new followers daily.
He was even boosted by more than 2million followers on Valentine's Day.
It shows that despite the negative press, and getting dropped recently by FIFA 19from their cover, nothing has stopped his momentum as one of the biggest influencers on the planet.
What that means monetarily to CR7...
According to social media experts The Social Club, it's a case by case charge for any sponsored ads the celebrity with over 500,000 followers could charge for a post.
Last year, Hopper HQ drew up an Instagram rich list claiming that Ronaldo can command around £570,000 per ad-based picture.
How that impacted Juventus...
When Ronaldo signed for the club, Juventus sold 520,000 shirts with his famous name and number on the back at around £90 a pop in just 24 hours.
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They recouped an astonishing £48m back in shirt sales, nearly half Ronaldo's transfer fee.
On Instagram they saw an incredible growth - gaining 12million new followers in the first four months he signed.
That hasn't abated, either. They've now swelled to 22,692,540 followers - gaining six million since those rape allegations.
They've overtaken Liverpool and PSG as the fourth biggest football club on Instagram.
As an average, Juventus are still adding roughly 40,000 followers a month since October - their biggest rise, like Ronaldo, was on Valentine's Day when they scored 515,640 followers.
On Facebook they're up to 36,960,047 likes.
Three million of those came in the months after Ronaldo signed for Juventus.
More fans are watching Juventus online now than ever before...
Online views on their YouTube channel rose 136% since Ronaldo joined the club, and again, they are staying steady.
When Ronaldo was announced as Juventus player seven months ago, 1.7m people watched a video announcing the deal.
Bearing in mind they now have 1,834,188 subscribers tells you the impact he's had.
On average, a standard video for a latest highlights package receives around 50,000 online views.
Two weeks ago, a birthday compilation video for Ronaldo got over 270,000 online views.
Attendances in Italian football have been in the decline.
Even Juventus have struggled to completely fill the 41,507 all-seater Allianz Stadium since they moved there in 2011.
But, incredibly, the Turin club have seen attendances rise by 4.54% since Ronaldo joined.
And they even recorded a record attendance at the stadium for a game against Inter Milan.
41, 495 fans flooded through the gates to see Ronaldo and Co. beat Internazionale 1-0 in a tight encounter.
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But spare a thought for Real Madrid...
Fans at the Santiago Bernabeu still haven't got over the loss of their talisman, if their attendances are anything to go by.
They opened their season with a comfortable 2-0 win over Getafe, but were cheered on by just over 48,000 supporters in Madrid.
Their average attendance has decreased to just 62,340 - last season they averaged 65,652.
Ronaldo's mentor Sir Alex Ferguson lived by the mantra that no player is bigger than the club.
However, in the case of this goalscoring phenomenon, it seems that the protege has proven the great Scot wrong.
Thanks to InfluencerDB for providing us with the results in growth for both the Ronaldo and Juventus Instagram accounts.