The social media data compiled by our friends over at Starcount for the top ten footballers in June 2013 revealed that the Premier League still has some walls to scale when it comes to player popularity.
La Liga vastly garnered the most attention, with its superstars Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi and Kaka underlining the weight of Real Madrid and Barcelona’s online fan base, along with icons Andres Iniesta, Mesut Ozil and David Villa.
But Brazil’s leading star Neymar, who had one of the most followed transfer sagas until he officially signed for the Spanish champions late last month, happened to be the one to rack up the most fans on Facebook in June – scooping 2.5 million ‘likes’.
Speculations regarding Cristiano Ronaldo’s next move during this summer’s transfer window unsurprisingly made the world’s most popular sportsman the most talked about footballer on Facebook.
His Manchester United predecessor David Beckham also had some attention, as he made the most of his recent China tour to snatch around 2 million new Tencent and Facebook fans.
Barcelona’s Lionel Messi turned out to be the last footballer in the list to attract over a million ‘likes’ on Facebook, taking his total tally on the network to 46 million members.
Below are the overall rankings of the Top 10 Footballers in June, with statistical facts researched by Starcount for that month.
1. Cristiano Ronaldo
The Real Madrid No.7 prolific goalscorer added over 700k followers to his Twitter page as he impressively advanced towards the 20m mark.
2. Neymar Jr. 
The new Barcelona signing accumulated 650k YouTube views on his official account, proving that he is a player many truly love to watch.
3. David Beckham
The retired English legend had almost 900k Facebook ‘likes’ thanks to his numerous posts related to his China tour over the course of the month.
4. Lionel Messi
Messi earned over 100k Tencent fans, increasing his social media influence, which is already accentuated through his near 47m Facebook fans.
5. Ronaldinho
His meeting with basketball superstar Kobe Bryant during the latter’s Black Mamba Tour in Brazil was enough to reward him with over 350k new Twitter followers and 500k Facebook fans.
6. Kaka
His lack of activity in the month of June did not prevent him from gathering over 900k fans across his networks, as he approached the 16m tally on Twitter.
7. Wayne Rooney
Heavy transfer talks surrounding him have enabled Rooney to benefit from over a million new followers across all his networks, including Chinese platform Sina.
8. Andres Iniesta
The Spanish midfielder got over 230k Twitter followers and reinforced his presence within Chinese network Tencent by collecting over 40,000 fans.
9. Mesut Ozil
The Real Madrid star, who reached 2m Twitter followers on June 1, received almost 300k more followers in the 30 days of the month.
10. David Villa
David Villa may be on his way to the Premier League, and speculations over a possible move to London got Facebook users talking about the key forward over 120k times.
