People can talk all they want about footballers and how they should simply stick to playing the game, but the reality is that players have much more power than anyone realises and they can make a serious impact on the general world.
There was an incident yesterday in Cristiano Ronaldo’s press conference where he was sat behind a couple of Coca-Cola bottles, but he immediately replace them with water at the first opportunity and made a point about avoiding fizzy drinks in favour of water:
Cristiano Ronaldo was angry because they put Coca Cola in front of him at the Portugal press conference, instead of water! ?
He moved them and said "Drink water" ?pic.twitter.com/U1aJg9PcXq
— FutbolBible (@FutbolBible) June 14, 2021
Initially it just looked like a bit of fun with an athlete trying to spread a message about healthier choices, while it may even have been positive for Coca-Cola as they were suddenly getting a lot of attention from the incident.
It turns out Ronaldo may have actually caused an interesting reaction here, with Marca reporting that the value of Coca-Cola has fallen by $4B due to a dramatic plunge in their stock market value.
Since Cristiano Ronaldo removed the two Coca-Cola bottles from his vicinity in favor of water, Coca-Cola have lost a total of $4 billion in value.https://t.co/4wtinuaUjV pic.twitter.com/IgiEefKbZa
— Zach Lowy (@ZachLowy) June 15, 2021
It may well bounce back over time, but that it shows just how influential some of these stars really are.