Ronaldo's bicycle kick vs Juventus
Published on 29 October 2026
On 3 April 2018, in Turin, Cristiano Ronaldo scored the most famous goal of his career: an overhead kick against Juventus that made the home crowd stand and applaud a player who had just hurt their team. This article breaks down that one moment in full, the goal itself, the reaction, the technique behind it, and the two later overhead kicks that complete the story, and it explains why this goal, more than any other, became Ronaldo's signature.
The promise is simple: everything you need to understand the goal, verified and in order, with nothing borrowed from other bicycle kicks that never happened.
The night: Juventus 0-3 Real Madrid
The setting was the Champions League quarter-final first leg at the Allianz Stadium in Turin. Real Madrid, the holders, travelled to face Juventus, the team they had beaten in the previous season's final, and they won 3-0. Ronaldo opened the scoring after just three minutes, flicking home from close range past Gianluigi Buffon, and that goal alone would have made it a good night. What followed made it historic.
In the second half, Juventus were already struggling. Paulo Dybala was sent off, and Madrid were in control, but the tie was not yet dead at 1-0. Then came the 64th minute. A mistake at the back gave Ronaldo the ball at a tight angle; he laid it back, Lucas Vázquez's shot was saved by Buffon, and the ball fell to Dani Carvajal on the right. Carvajal lifted a cross back into the penalty area, and Ronaldo, with his back to goal, launched himself into the air and met it with a perfect overhead kick into the top corner. Buffon, one of the greatest goalkeepers in history, stood motionless. Marcelo added a third goal late on, but nobody remembers the third goal. They remember the second.
The standing ovation
What made the night unique was not just the goal but the reaction. The Juventus supporters in Turin rose to their feet and applauded Ronaldo as he celebrated, applauding an opposition player who had just scored against their team in a Champions League quarter-final. It is one of the rarest sights in football: home fans saluting an away player not out of politeness, but out of recognition that they had just seen something extraordinary.
Ronaldo understood immediately what had happened. Speaking to UEFA afterwards, he said it was an unbelievable moment, thanked the Juventus supporters, and said that what they had done for him was amazing and had never happened in his career so far. The next day, speaking to Real Madrid TV, he went further, calling it surely his best goal, and explaining that he had been trying to score such a goal for a long time, that other attempts had gone wrong, and that this time he had caught the ball perfectly. In 2019, speaking to DAZN, he again named the Juventus goal as the best he had scored in his career. The goal was also nominated for UEFA's Goal of the Season, ahead of Gareth Bale's own acrobatic effort in the Kyiv final that year, which tells you how the goal was rated even inside the same Madrid season.
Why the goal mattered beyond the night
The goal did three things at once. First, it effectively settled the tie: at 2-0 away from home, with Juventus down to ten men, Madrid's place in the semi-finals was all but secure, and they went on to win a third straight European Cup. Second, it made Ronaldo the first player to score in ten consecutive Champions League matches, a record that underlined how the goal was part of a scoring run, not an isolated piece of luck. Third, and most strangely, it changed his relationship with Juventus itself: three months later, he joined the club whose fans had applauded him, for a fee of 100 million euros plus 12 million euros in additional costs, as covered in our Cristiano Ronaldo 2018 review.
There is also a notable near-miss in the goal's afterlife. The Juventus bicycle kick did not win the 2018 FIFA Puskás Award for the best goal of the year; that award went to Mohamed Salah, whose own bicycle kick was judged ahead of it. The detail matters because it stops the goal's story from becoming a simple coronation: even the most famous goal of Ronaldo's career did not sweep every prize, and its reputation rests on what people saw, not on what committees voted for.
Technique breakdown: why this one worked
This section is analysis, describing a technique rather than reporting a measurement, and no height or speed figure is claimed for the kick, because no reliable one was published. An overhead kick, or bicycle kick, is one of the hardest finishes in football for four linked reasons, and the Juventus goal shows all four being solved at once.
First, positioning: Ronaldo had to arrive in the penalty area at the exact moment Carvajal's cross came back in, with his body between the ball and the goal rather than facing it. Second, timing: he left the ground before the ball arrived, trusting that the cross would reach the spot where he would be, not the spot where he was standing. Third, body shape: with his back to goal, he arched backwards, kept his eye on the ball over his shoulder, and struck it with his right foot at the top of his jump, generating power from his core and his falling momentum rather than from a run-up. Fourth, contact: he met the ball cleanly, high enough and centrally enough that it flew into the top corner rather than ballooning over the bar, which is what happens to most overhead attempts.
That last point is why Ronaldo's own comment matters. He had attempted overhead kicks for years, and most of them had gone wrong, wide, high or mishit. The Juventus goal worked because every element lined up in a match that mattered, against a goalkeeper who could not react, in front of a crowd that recognised it instantly. Technique alone does not explain it; technique plus occasion does.
The other overhead kicks: only the verified ones
Ronaldo has scored remarkably few true bicycle-kick goals in a career of more than 900 goals, and this article lists only the ones that can be sourced. There are three in total, and the Juventus goal is the first.
The second came for Portugal against Poland in the UEFA Nations League on 15 November 2024, when Ronaldo scored an overhead kick in a 5-1 win, a goal that immediately drew comparisons with the 2018 strike. The third came at the age of 40, for Al Nassr against Al Khaleej in the Saudi Pro League on 23 November 2025, when he met a cross from Nawaf Boushal deep into stoppage time with an overhead finish to seal a 4-1 win. That goal was reported as the 954th of his career, and it was described by the BBC as reminiscent of the Juventus bicycle kick of 2018.
Everything else in this category should be treated with care. Ronaldo has scored many acrobatic goals, including backheels and leaping volleys, but a backheel is not a bicycle kick, and a volley is not an overhead kick. The discipline of counting only three keeps the Juventus goal in its proper place: not as one of many, but as the first and most famous of a very short list. For his later career, see our Cristiano Ronaldo at Al Nassr guide and our Cristiano Ronaldo career stats.
Why it became iconic
Great goals become iconic for reasons beyond their beauty, and the Juventus goal has all of them. It was scored in the Champions League knockout rounds, not in a friendly or a dead rubber. It was scored away from home, against a great team, past a great goalkeeper. It was applauded by the opposition's own supporters, which is the rarest endorsement in football. And it was scored by a player who had been chasing that exact goal for years, which gave it a narrative arc: the attempt that finally came off, on the biggest stage, at the age of 33.
It also arrived at the perfect point in Ronaldo's career. He was old enough for the goal to feel like a culmination, young enough to still be at his athletic peak, and about to leave Madrid, which meant the goal became a farewell gift to the club as well as a highlight. When fans argue about Ronaldo's best goal, they usually end up here, not because it was his most important goal in terms of trophies, but because it was the one that made even his opponents applaud. For the year around it, see our Cristiano Ronaldo 2018 review and our Cristiano Ronaldo profile.
Frequently Asked Questions
When did Ronaldo score his bicycle kick against Juventus?
On 3 April 2018, in Turin, in the Champions League quarter-final first leg. Real Madrid won 3-0, and the overhead kick in the 64th minute, from a Dani Carvajal cross, made it 2-0.
Why did Juventus fans applaud Ronaldo's goal?
Because the goal was so spectacular that the home supporters rose to salute it, even though it was scored against their team. Ronaldo said afterwards that such a reaction had never happened to him before in his career.
Did Ronaldo call the Juventus goal his best ever?
Yes. The day after the match he told Real Madrid TV it was surely his best goal, and in 2019 he again named it the best he had scored in his career.
How many bicycle-kick goals has Ronaldo scored?
Three verified ones: against Juventus in 2018, for Portugal against Poland in November 2024, and for Al Nassr against Al Khaleej in November 2025. Other acrobatic goals, such as backheels, are not bicycle kicks.
Did the Juventus bicycle kick win the Puskás Award?
No. It was nominated for UEFA's Goal of the Season, but the 2018 FIFA Puskás Award went to Mohamed Salah, whose own bicycle kick was judged ahead of it.
What record did Ronaldo set with the Juventus goal?
He became the first player to score in ten consecutive Champions League matches, and he finished that season as the competition's top scorer with 15 goals.
