Pour one out for Cristiano Ronaldo’s publicists this morning, because they’re probably fired. The Real Madrid star flew to Japan to appear on the news show Super News, and what proceeded was one of the most awkward 12 minute segments you’ve seen.
Putting Cristiano Ronaldo on Japanese TV was a bad idea
Studying abs, using weird facial exercise equipment: It’s all in a day’s work for the Japanese show Super News.
James Dator has been covering a wide range of sports for SB Nation for over a decade, with a special focus on the NFL.
There’s an underlying tension in every second of this interview. It’s probably tough to find a Portuguese-Japanese translator, so instead the entire interview is done in English. If you’ve listened to Cristiano before you know his English isn’t quite perfect and only one of the five hosts of Super News speaks English at all.
Yes, there was a lot of weirdness.
That entrance ...
This is really pretty impressive. The producers of Super News didn’t have a grand walkway for Ronaldo to stroll, or space to unroll a red carpet. They went for the next best thing: A smoke machine, some strobes and plenty of high fives from the station’s salary men and women. Bernabéu eat your heart out.
That time Ronaldo joked about tossing aside a gift ...
There is a well-established gift culture in Japan, far greater than we have here in the U.S. If you’re welcoming someone or being invited somewhere it’s expected you always bring a gift. It doesn’t need to be anything hugely lavish, but it does need to be executed with effort — like, say, telling Ronaldo that you grew special sunflowers just for him.
Then he joked about throwing them away.
That time his abs were studied ...
That moment where they did face exercises ...
You know, to strengthen your jaw muscles, apparently.
That thing where you’ve had enough ...
This is the precise moment Ronaldo decided to fire his publicist.
About those translation issues ...
Host: "Do you have any special way to refresh yourself when you change your mind?"
Ronaldo: "What you ... I don't understand."
Host: "Like, uh .... how do you refresh yourself when you change your mind? Is there anything special?"
Ronaldo:
The important thing is that he made it through, relatively unscathed. It could have gone a whole lot worse, so now Ronaldo can get back to his favorite thing in Japan: Trying different discs of sushi. Yep, he said that.
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