The a-team; Cristiano Ronaldo, the world's most creative and charismatic young soccer player, teams up with Daria Werbowy, in shapely, energetic dresses that score major glamour points.

Byline: Tim Adams

Cristiano Ronaldo has plenty to celebrate. Earlier today he scored the winning goal for his soccer team, Manchester United, against their bitterest local rival. Later he watched a postmatch analysis in which he was described, as he routinely is, as the most gifted young player in the world. And tonight he is sitting on a private jet returning to his native Portugal, sipping a glass of champagne, surrounded by his family, who are raucously reliving the game's highlights.

He leans back and grins broadly as he enjoys the banter between his cousin and brother and mother. They call soccer the beautiful game, and few have ever made it look prettier than Ronaldo. He wears a Dolce & Gabbana leather flying jacket on the plane, which, with his slicked-back curls, gives him something of the look of a Battle of Britain fighter pilot (despite an earring stud or two). One leg of his jeans is rolled up to the thigh, and occasionally he scoops a handful of ice from a Moet bucket to soothe a knee swollen from the day's battles. In his halting, boyish English he describes to me his curious, charmed life.

To most European eyes, the 22-year-old Ronaldo gives a very good impression of a man who has everything. His improbable brilliance as a player for one of the world's wealthiest clubs and for Portugal's national team is matched by his growing reputation as one of the Continent's most eligible young men. Three years ago he replaced David Beckham in the number seven shirt of the Manchester United team, and he has subsequently usurped his place in the headlines (Beckham's much-publicized move to America to join the Los Angeles Galaxy notwithstanding). The Portuguese and British press speculate obsessively about Ronaldo's romantic life: He has been linked with a swelling cast of models and TV presenters, some eager to sell their stories, some keen to duck the limelight. Ronaldo insists he does not currently have anyone significant to share his designer tastes with, though he suggests there is no shortage of applicants. "According to the newspapers, I have 20 girlfriends," he says, smiling. "But I have only met two or three of them."

Ronaldo lives with his elder brother and his cousin, who act as his minders, in a big converted farmhouse "with cows and stuff" in the countryside outside Manchester. They inhabit a very upscale version of a fraternity lifestyle: video games, shopping jaunts, endless sporting competition, big nights out when the game schedule allows. Occasionally Ro_naldo's mother, the ultimate soccer mom, flies in to cook for them and tidy up.

If Ronaldo goes out alone, he is mobbed. The attention makes life "tricky" for girlfriends, he suggests, "but then you can't have everything." The only abiding love interest he admits to is the soccer ball. "Some lads tell me that Ronaldo plays too much with the ball," he says of himself. "It's true: I am with the ball all the time, at home, whatever. It never leaves me. In fact, I don't know why I love so much the ball, but I do."

Soccer players talk a lot about the importance of keeping their feet on the ground; Ronaldo goes through the motions of this, insists he is only one part of a team, but in everything he ...