“124m more than his nearest rival in 2nd place Lionel Messi” – Piers Morgan congratulates Cristiano Ronaldo on becoming first person to reach 500 million followers on Instagram

Portugal captain Cristiano Ronaldo recently became the first person to reach 500 million followers on Instagram while Lionel Messi is a distant second. Piers Morgan, who conducted the Manchester United forward's controversial interview last week, congratulated him on Twitter.

Morgan pointed out that the Portuguese ace has 124 million more followers than the Paris Saint-Germain talisman. The Argentine is the second-most followed person on the social media platform with 376 million followers.

Morgan is known for his outspoken behavior and is a well-known Ronaldo fan. He congratulated the striker for becoming the first person to breach the 500-million followers mark on Instagram. He tweeted:

"BREAKING: Cristiano Ronaldo becomes first person to reach 500m followers on Instagram, 124m more than his nearest rival in 2nd place… Lionel Messi. Congrats ⁦⁦@Cristiano"

The former Real Madrid has a strong online presence. Apart from 500 million followers on Instagram, he has a 105 million+ strong fan following on Twitter and also has 124 million followers on Facebook.

Messi does not have an official Twitter account and Adidas runs an account by the name of TeamMessi on the platform. He has 107 million followers on Facebook, 14 million fewer than his eternal rival.

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2022 FIFA World Cup: The last dance for Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi at the ultimate football tournament in the world

The legendary duo will be making their fifth and presumably final appearance at the ongoing FIFA World Cup in Qatar.

The Manchester United man will be in action on Thursday (November 24) when Portugal take on Ghana in a Group H fixture. Meanwhile, Argentina take on Saudi Arabia in a highly anticipated Group C game on Wednesday.

Argentina are strong favorites as they head into the competition on a 36-game unbeaten run. The PSG man has scored in each of Argentina's last four games, racking up 10 goals.

Ronaldo, on the other hand, has scored just two goals for Portugal since last November.

Speaking at a press conference, he joked that he would like to checkmate the Argentina captain. He said (via Hindustan Times):

"I would like to be the player to checkmate Messi, it happened in the chess game and in football, it would be magic."

Ronaldo has seen some off-the-field controversy heading into the World Cup, which began following his interview with Morgan. He will be out to prove a point at the main event and, as always, silence his critics with his performance on the field.