Cristiano Ronaldo releases statement firmly denying rape allegations

Cristiano Ronaldo has directly addressed the sexual assault allegations made against him by firmly denying the accusations.

Speaking to Der Spiegel last week, Kathryn Mayorga, 34, accused Ronaldo of raping her in a Las Vegas hotel room in June, 2009. Ms Mayorga also alleges that she filed a rape report with police the next day and it is claimed that she negotiated a £287,000 out-of-court settlement with Ronaldo’s legal team in 2010, which stipulated that she would not go public with her allegations. Ronaldo, who was in the process of moving to Real Madrid from Manchester United at the time, initially branded the allegations "fake news" in an Instagram video last week. He has now directly referenced them in a statement on his Twitter account on Wednesday afternoon. https://twitter.com/Cristiano/status/1047490574687907841 https://twitter.com/Cristiano/status/1047490701137784832 "I firmly deny the accusations being issued against me," Ronaldo wrote. "Rape is an abominable crime that goes against everything that I am and believe in. "Keen as I may be to clear my name, I refuse to feed the media spectacle created by people seeking to promote themselves at my expense. "My clear conscious will thereby allow me to await with tranquillity the results of any and all investigations." Ms Mayorga's legal representatives are expected to hold a press conference in Las Vegas late on Wednesday night to discuss the allegations in further detail.