Juventus have taken their legal battle with Cristiano Ronaldo to Italy’s Court of Cassation, challenging a ruling that ordered the club to pay the Portuguese forward €9.8m in outstanding wages. More than five years after the pandemic-era pay deal at the heart of the case, the Cristiano Ronaldo Juventus wage dispute is still not over.
The latest twist surfaced this week through La Gazzetta dello Sport. Juventus confirmed in their 2025-26 financial report that they filed the appeal on March 27, 2026, and are still waiting for a hearing date. Neither the club nor the player has said much publicly, so the details come from the filing and the Italian press.
What the Ronaldo and Juventus wage dispute is about
The dispute dates back to Covid-19. It centres on an agreement reached during the pandemic, under which Juventus reportedly committed to paying €19.5m in deferred wages. Players across Serie A accepted pay cuts and delays while football was shut down, and Ronaldo was one of them.
The money never arrived in full. The dispute goes back to 2021, when Ronaldo left the Allianz Stadium to return to Manchester United. He later said the club had not honoured the arrangement.
The “Ronaldo Paper” at the centre of the case
The file at the heart of the matter is known in Italy as the “Ronaldo Paper.” It emerged during the Prisma investigation into Juventus’ financial practices, where prosecutors alleged the club had made private agreements with players to defer wages without accurately reflecting them in its official financial statements. The controversy contributed to the mass resignation of Juventus’ board, including former president Andrea Agnelli.
The document has a weakness. It carried no signature from Ronaldo, so he started legal action in September 2023 and the matter went to arbitration. The paper’s legal weight was disputed, but it still shaped everything that followed.
How the case reached this point
On April 17, 2024, the arbitration panel ruled in Ronaldo’s favour, awarding him compensation for half of the claimed amount. The panel ruled by majority that Juventus must pay €9.8m plus interest and inflation adjustments.
It was a split decision. The panel did not find that Juventus deliberately misled the player, and it noted that Ronaldo did not request the money when he left Italy in 2021. That is why he received roughly half of his claim and not the full amount.
| Date | Development |
|---|---|
| 2021 | Ronaldo leaves Juventus for Manchester United, the deferred wages still in dispute |
| 2023 | Ronaldo begins proceedings; the parties agree to arbitration |
| April 2024 | Arbitration panel orders Juventus to pay €9.8m |
| September 2024 | Juventus challenge the award before the Turin court |
| January 13, 2026 | Turin labour court rejects the challenge |
| March 27, 2026 | Juventus file their appeal to the Court of Cassation |
| October 2026 | Appeal reported by Gazzetta; hearing date not yet set |
The club has not been refusing to hand over the cash. Juventus president Gianluca Ferrero said at a shareholders’ meeting in late 2024 that Ronaldo had been paid in April and that no risk fund was needed. He added that the club disagreed with a ruling that split responsibility equally, and had appealed it at the Turin court.
So the question now is whether Juventus can get that money back. As things stand, Ronaldo keeps the €9.8m he has already received, while the club waits for a hearing in Rome.
Why the Supreme Court may not reopen the facts
Many headlines say “Supreme Court,” but the court is not going to rehear the story from scratch. The Court of Cassation will only review the legal legitimacy of the earlier decisions.
Juventus’s own report stresses this point. The club noted that the Turin ruling was limited to checking the formal defects it had alleged, and did not decide the merits of the case. The January judges also found no formal errors in the arbitration decision and ordered Juventus to pay an additional €80,000 in legal costs.
La Sicilia lays out three realistic outcomes:
- Appeal rejected or declared inadmissible: The Turin ruling stands and the award is locked in.
- Appeal accepted with referral: If the court finds a legal error, it can annul the Turin decision and send the case to a different judge.
- Direct decision: The court could rule on the merits if no further factual investigation is needed, or correct the reasoning while leaving the outcome unchanged.
If Juventus win, the Turin club could overturn the earlier decision and recover the millions already paid to its former star. Nothing guarantees that. The appeal itself does not establish that Juventus will succeed in overturning the ruling.
Will this hurt Juventus financially?
Juventus told investors not to expect much damage. The club said the financial impact of the arbitration award has been reflected in its accounts since the 2023-24 financial year, so no negative impact is anticipated for current or future statements. The payout is already priced in, and any recovery would be a bonus.
For Juventus, the case is a reminder of the Agnelli era and the accounting scandals that forced out the old board. For Ronaldo, it is partly about the money and partly about principle. He left Juventus after 101 goals in 134 appearances, helping them to two Serie A titles and a Coppa Italia. He is now 41 and plays for Al-Nassr in Saudi Arabia, and a legal fight in Italy is not what his legacy needs at this stage of his career.
The next step is for the Court of Cassation to set a hearing. Italian appeals can move slowly, so a final answer may take some time. Until the judges rule, the Cristiano Ronaldo Juventus wage dispute remains open, with the €9.8m in Ronaldo’s account and a club that refuses to treat the matter as closed.
