Portugal’s official national football team Instagram page lost more than 1.4 million followers in just 24 hours after a dispute between team captain Cristiano Ronaldo and head coach Jorge Jesus.
According to a report by The PUNCH, a quick data check on Friday morning revealed that the team’s official Instagram account dropped from nearly 24.9 million followers down to 23.5 million. The mass unfollow started right after Ronaldo walked out of Portugal’s training camp in Denmark on Wednesday after coach Jorge Jesus dropped the veteran star from the starting lineup.
The disagreement escalated when the coach spoke about the situation publicly. In response, Ronaldo met with Pedro Proença, the president of the Portuguese Football Federation, before packing up and leaving the camp entirely.
International media and Portuguese outlets quickly tracked the subscriber drop. Broadcaster Renascença, using data from HypeAuditor, and sports newspaper A Bola both reported hundreds of thousands of unfollows within hours of the news breaking.
Meanwhile, Ronaldo’s followers on social media remains untouched, with his Instagram account currently siting at about 679 million followers, completely crippling the entire online audience of the national team.
According to comments gathered by A Bola and Goal, several users openly admitted they only followed the national team account because of Ronaldo.
Ronaldo addressed the situation on his personal page about his departure, telling his fans to stay calm that he would explain his reasons in due time.
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