Cristiano Ronaldo showed his exasperation at a refereeing mistake which saw his seemingly legitimate Portugal goal disallowed against Serbia in Belgrade by throwing his captain’s armband to the floor, and the armband has since raised 64,000 euros.
Picked up by a local firefighter, Djordje Vukicevic, in the Serbian stadium, the armband has been auctioned and has raised money which will be used to fund the treatment of a six-month old Serbian boy who suffers from spinal muscular atrophy.
“The humanitarian auction for Cristiano Ronaldo’s armband has just ended at the brilliant figure of 7.5 million dinars,” Jovan Simic, the founder of the ‘Together for Life’ charity, explained on Twitter.
The armband was thrown to the ground as Ronaldo saw a shot which appeared to cross the line not be given, and there was no VAR technology in use in the World Cup qualifiers to correct the mistake.
The match finished 2-2 and Ronaldo would then receive a yellow card for his quite forceful protests towards the match official.