Cristano Ronaldo has become the first ever athlete to gain 100 million Facebook followers.

The Real Madrid and Portugal superstar reached the milestone on his Facebook page on Tuesday, adding to a Twitter following which exceeds 30 million.

Ronaldo’s popularity on Facebook is truly staggering. He has almost 30 million MORE followers than even his great sporting rival Lionel Messi.

If all his followers lived in one country, it would be the 13th biggest country in the world by population, and considerably bigger than the likes of Germany, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

Ronaldo’s extreme celebrity also means financial gain for his sponsors and backers.

As reported by the Daily Mail this morning: “The commercial power of Ronaldo … was demonstrated when he posted six messages over two days advertising the Tag Heuer watch brand.

“These received 34.9m Facebook hits and 2.4m likes, valued at more than £300,000 by the watch company.”