Cristiano Ronaldo Slams Door on His Child’s Mother

Soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo has apparently taken a hard line with the mother of his young son, rejecting her pleas to see the baby and be a part of his life. The sticking point: About $15 million.

Ronaldo shocked the world last July when he announced that he had fathered a child.

He quickly let it be known that he used a surrogate mother. But it turned out that the baby was the result of a one-night stand.

Initial reports said the woman was a waitress in Los Angeles, but London’s Daily Mail claims the mother is a British student, who is now allegedly pressuring Ronaldo for access to the baby.

They reportedly met in a London night club.

Ronaldo, at the urging of his strong-willed mother, paid the 20-year-old woman £10million to give up all rights to the baby and to sign to a confidentiality agreement.

But sources told the newspaper that she now bitterly regrets handing over her baby, and has offered to pay back the money to see the child.

Now the mother calls Ronaldo late at night and “pleads” with him to see their child, but the footballer taunts her “by telling her he may consider her requests… if she repays some of the money,” according to the Sunday Mirror.
“As far as he is concerned, it was her choice, her decision. He said ‘She has zero rights to my son. She’s not seeing him ever again,” a friend of the 25-year-old soccer superstar said.

The paternity deal, brokered in New York, and supervised by mother Dolores Aveiro, 55, resulted in the baby being sent to Portugal to be raised by Ronaldo’s mother and sisters Elma, 34, and Liliana Cátia, 33.

The baby was born June 17, and paternity was proved through a DNA test. Shortly thereafter, Ronaldo made the startling announcement on his official Facebook page:

“It is with great joy and emotion that I inform I have recently become father to a baby boy.”

Nike to Replace Reebok as N.F.L.’s Licensed-Apparel Maker

The N.F.L. said Tuesday that Nike would become the league’s exclusive maker of licensed on-field apparel including uniforms, clothing worn on the sidelines and fan gear. Nike replaces Reebok, whose agreement is expiring.
Terms of the deal were not announced. But the league said its contract with Nike was for five years and would begin in April 2012. Reebok has a 10-year contract with the N.F.L. that was originally worth at least $250 million to the league.

Nike and Reebok are the two largest players in the sports-apparel market, and they have battled to secure licensing deals with various professional leagues and top players in tennis, golf and other sports.

The deals to secure the licensing rights with the leagues are expensive. But they often pay for themselves because professional athletes are so ubiquitous that they effectively are billboards for the apparel makers who actively market high-performance gear to consumers.

“It’s another opportunity to put the swoosh on world-class athletes, and that’s what they’re all about, and it’s how have they’ve operated for a long time,” said Matt Arnold, a consumer analyst at Edward Jones & Company in St. Louis.

The N.F.L. also extended agreements with Under Armour (sponsor of the N.F.L. Combine), GIII (outerwear), VF (T-shirts and fleeces) and Outerstuff (youth apparel). The league also signed agreements with New Era (hats for sideline personnel and fans) and ’47 Brand (hats for fans).

Nearly half of the N.F.L.’s income from licensed goods comes from apparel and headwear, according to Ira Mayer, the editor of The Licensing Letter, an industry newsletter. Video games, trading cards and novelty goods make up the remainder. By comparison, apparel (including hats) and footwear make up 32 percent of the N.B.A. income from licensed goods.

Mayer said there were risks for Nike, most notably the threat of a work stoppage, which would drastically cut into sales of licensed goods. A surge in counterfeit merchandise can also cut into profits. Nike, like Reebok, also operates in a faster-moving marketplace, where merchandise is requested almost overnight.

For example, minutes after Roy Halladay of the Philadelphia Phillies pitched a no-hitter in the first game of the National League division series last week, licensing officials from Major League Baseball were in talks with Majestic, which makes licensed T-shirts for the league. Commemorative T-shirts were on sale in time for Game 2, less than 48 hours later.

“The biggest change is how event-oriented the licensing programs are now,” Mayer said. “That stuff happens much faster now.”