The president of the Portuguese Football Federation has defendeda Cristiano Ronaldoafter the national team’s captain received criticism for not attending the funeral ofDiogo Jota.
The world of football was stunned a month ago when the news was known that Jota and his brother André Silva had died in a car accident in northern Spain.
The tragic accident occurred just 11 days after Jota married his childhood girlfriend, Cardoso Rute, also 28 years old, who is the mother of his two children Dinis, four years old, and Duarte, two, as well as his little daughter Mafalda, eight months.
Ronaldo was Jota’s captain in the Portuguese team andMany were surprised that he was not present at the funeralthat took place days later in Gondomar.
Some were more than surprised, with Ronaldo facing online criticism for his absence after Portugal stars asBruno Fernandes , Ruben daysyBernardo Silvamade appearances.
It is said that the starde al-nassrHe did not make the trip because he did not want his presence to eclipsara the importance of people paying tribute to Jota and his brother.
And Pedro Proenca, president of the Portuguese Football Federation, has responded to criticism.
“It is an immense injustice to say that Christian, somehow, had a more distant role in this,” he said.
‘From the first moment the captain was with us and was one of the people who connected the most with the family of the National Team, with Jota’s own blood.
And I repeat it: what they said of our captain is unfair. Cristiano Ronaldo was one of the ones who felt him the most, especially because he was a faithful jota companion.
‘His physical absence means nothing more than that, because he never abandoned this family.’
Jota and Ronaldo never played together at club level, but they were teammates in the Portuguese national team.
Both shared the triumphs of Portugal in the League of Nations in 2019 and 2025 and played a total of 32 times together.
After the death of Jota and his brother André, Ronaldo wrote on social networks: “It makes no sense. Right now we were together in the national team, just now you had married.”
To his family, his wife and children, I send my condolences and I wish them all the strength of the world. I know they will always be with them.
Rest in peace, Diogo and André. We will miss them.
In June, Ronaldo guided his team to the glory of the League of Nations in a team of which Jota was also part of, when Portugal beat Spain 5-3 in penalties.
He was also defender of his sister, Katia, after not attending.
She wrote on Instagram: ‘When my father died, in addition to the pain of loss, we had to deal with an avalanche of cameras and curious spectators in the cemetery and in all the places we were going.
‘And the attention was not the one that is today in terms of access … at no time we could (the children) leave the chapel, it was only possible at the time of the burial, such was the stir.
At the funeral, they were presidents and coaches of the national team at that time, such as Luís Filipe Scolari, etc. I don’t remember seeing any. And, of course, they greeted me. The pain blinded me.
About pain, family and real support … You will never know what it means until you experience it. If someone sends me a message criticizing something my brother does, I will block it (I will ignore it completely); That is, it will only do it once.
It is exhausting. Fanaticism. Criticism for nothing, I repeat, for nothing … a sick society … we all have a family.
It is absurdly shameful to see how television channels, commentators and social networks emphasize an absence (wise) instead of respecting with respect the pain of a mutilated family, destroyed by the loss of two brothers. I am even ashamed to see it. It is unfortunate.
And so the world goes … society and opinion. Not anything is worth it today. They have become bottomless wells. I’m sorry … and the war is also like that. Believe me. Human evil is also a war. And every day we have to fight her. And so continue.
