Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are probably the two most recognisable sportsmen in the world and now some number crunching by Expert Market UK has shown that the two greatest footballers of our generation earn £1 million faster than any other sportsman on this planet.
The figures released by Expert Market UK break down sports stars’ earnings based on the Forbes rich list and place them into context with the average 9-5 job of any working professional.
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The study shows that based on a normal 9-5 working day, Cristiano Ronaldo would need only 45 hours or a total of 5.68 working days to reach the magical figure of £1 million. Lionel Messi is also not too bad and is second on this list taking only 5.96 days to reach the million mark.
Also read: 10 highest paid sportsmen in the world
The duo of Ronaldo and Messi are well and truly ahead of the other sport stars. American football quarterback Joe Flacco is third on this list. The Baltimore Ravens player is surprisingly ahead of some other famous names like Lewis Hamilton and Floyd Mayweather.
After the top 3, the list becomes more varied with Formula one drivers Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel at 4th and 5th followed by American football star Eli Manning and professional boxer Floyd ‘Money’ Mayweather.
Famous baseball player Ryan Howard takes the eighth position, followed by Real Madrid’s Gareth Bale who is the only other footballer in the top 10. The top 10 list is rounded off by Basketball legend and superstar Lebron James.
Other famous names include Wayne Rooney at 13th, Eden Hazard at 17th and Sergio Aguero at 18th while UFC fighter Ronda Rousey is the fastest woman to £1 million narrowly beating out Tennis star Serena Williams.
Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal do not feature anywhere close to the top 10, with the Swiss maestro taking 40.78 days while Nadal takes 57.84 days to earn the same amount. However, the study shows that top sports stars definitely earn a lot more than any other profession with even CEOs of companies taking around 8 years on an average to earn £1 million.
Also read: 10 highest paid footballers in the world
Here is the list of the 10 fastest earning sportsman according to Expert Market UK:
| Rank | Name | Sport | Days taken to earn £1 million |
| 1 | Cristiano Ronaldo | Football | 5.68 |
| 2 | Lionel Messi | Football | 5.96 |
| 3 | Joe Flacco | American football | 7.23 |
| 4 | Lewis Hamilton | Formula 1 | 7.57 |
| 5 | Sebastian Vettel | Formula 1 | 7.96 |
| 6 | Eli Manning | American football | 8.60 |
| 7 | Floyd Mayweather | Boxing | 9.93 |
| 8 | Ryan Howard | Baseball | 12.72 |
| 9 | Gareth Bale | Football | 12.77 |
| 10 | Lebron James | Basketball | 13.71 |
Expert Market UK’s full list can be found here
