It was announced on April 17, 2024 that the legal case between Juventus and Ronaldo had been settled in the player’s favour. As a result, Juve were ordered to pay the Portuguese €9,774,166.66 in total.
It all stems from wages that were deferred during the COVID-19 pandemic. Juve’s first-team players agreed to defer four months’ worth of wages at the height of the global health crisis, when football was suspended in Europe and then resumed without spectators allowed in stadiums. These measures saw clubs across the world lose huge amounts of revenue, so they sometimes came to agreements to offset those costs by delaying certain payments, such as player salaries.
The agreement with the club, as Tuttosport outlined, was for three months of those deferred wages to be repaid to players over the coming seasons. However, Juventus argued that, in Ronaldo’s case, they didn’t have to. The club said that, as part of Ronaldo’s transfer to Manchester United in August 2021, he signed an agreement stating that Juve had no further financial obligations towards him. Juve felt that deal superseded their previous commitment to repaying those deferred wages. Ronaldo’s lawyers argued that that was not legally correct, and the official ruling agreed with them.
The judgement from the arbitration panel in Milan said, as per Tuttosport, that Juve did indeed have a “pre-contractual liability” and were guilty of “contributory negligence” towards Ronaldo. They were therefore ordered to pay the sum due, plus interest. Juventus have not yet commented on the ruling or stated whether they might appeal.
This is not the first case of its kind between Juve and a player seeking unpaid sums relating to these “salary manoeuvres”. Paulo Dybala opened a case against the club to recoup around €3.7m last year.
Ronaldo had joined Juventus from Real Madrid on July 10, 2018, in a transfer worth €112 million. He signed a four-year contract.
It was a record deal for a player over the age of 30 and the most expensive signing ever made by an Italian club.
