Jerome Kalu

 

Editor’s Note

The debate of  the best, out of Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi still ablaze the town in an inferno of arguments as fans through fumes and fare; through sentiments and acme of emotions judge the duo differently on who to bag the GOAT as though GOAT was an international award. And while this debate continues, you’ll agree that if you’re a genuine football lover, both Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are the most-talked footballers, whose fantastic performances over the years have left everyone anticipating over who is actually the best between both of them, to date. Going by their football age, both players; Ronaldo and Messi, are rapidly advancing and very soon, both should strike the door of retirement but neither of them are willing to pull off their jersey, yet until the best player is lucidly ascertained, perhaps. Note: this post is not to legibly pass verdict on the best player out of them but to pass a critical review on them and leave the judgment to you. But the clamour, here is a summary of how and where they started, especially on some fascinating things about these World Best players which also made their fans allover ascribe them as Genius Of All Times (GOAT). — Enoch Oyedibu.

 

Cristiano Ronaldo At The Feast of GOAT

Cristiano Ronaldo, who is a native of Portugal, 5th of February 1985 let himself out to the world of flesh but it was not until 2002, he started his professional football career with Sporting CP.

 

As fate would have it, he was signed to Manchester United in 2003 at age 18, then to Real Madrid in 2009, to Juventus in Real Madrid 2018 and back to his initial Club Man-U in 2021 where he won the FA Cup at age 18 in his first season.

Meanwhile, at age 23, he won three consecutive Premier League titles, the Champions League and the FIFA Club World Cup; he won his first Ballon d’Or. Ronaldo was the subject of the then-most expensive association football transfer when he signed for Real Madrid in 2009 in a transfer worth €94 million (£80 million), where he won 15 trophies, including two La Liga titles, two Copa del Rey, and four Champions Leagues, and became the club’s all-time top goal-scorer. He won back-to-back Ballons d’Or in 2013 and 2014, and again in 2016 and 2017, and was runner-up three times behind Lionel Messi, his perceived career rival.

In 2018, he signed for Juventus in a transfer worth an initial €100 million (£88 million), the most expensive transfer for an Italian club and for a player over 30 years old. He won two Serie A titles, two Supercoppe Italiana, and a Coppa Italia, before returning to Manchester United in 2021.

 

While he was age 18, he made his international debut for Portugal in 2003 and has since earned over 190 caps, making him Portugal’s most-capped player. With more than 100 goals at international level, he is also the nation’s all-time top goalscorer. Ronaldo has played in and scored at 11 major tournaments; he scored his first international goal at Euro 2004, where he helped Portugal reach the final. He assumed captaincy of the national team in July 2008. In 2015, Ronaldo was named the best Portuguese player of all time by the Portuguese Football Federation. The following year, he led Portugal to their first major tournament title at Euro 2016, and received the Silver Boot as the second-highest goalscorer of the tournament. He also led them to victory in the inaugural UEFA Nations League in 2019, and later received the Golden Boot as top scorer of Euro 2020.

 

To note, one of the world’s most marketable and famous athletes, Ronaldo was ranked the world’s highest-paid athlete by Forbes in 2016 and 2017 and the world’s most famous athlete by ESPN from 2016 to 2019. Time included him on their list of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2014. He is the first footballer and the third sportsman to earn US$1 billion in his career.

 

Read Also: PSG president threatens Mbappe at Messi’s unveiling

 

Feast of GOAT Welcomes Lionel Messi In Style

 

Lionel Messi, a native of Argentina, born on born 24th of June, 1987. He, in 1995 joined the youth team of Newell’s Old Boys (a Rosario-based top-division football club) which phenomenal skills made him began to play for FC Barcelona’s under-14 team after he relocated to Spain to join Barcelona at the age of 13, which he made his competitive debut at aged 17 in October 2004, where he scored 21 goals in 14 games for the junior team which promoted to graduate through the higher-level teams and at age 16 he was given his informal debut with FC Barcelona in a friendly. This is one of the things that made him enter into the competitive feast of GOAT in style.

 

He established himself as an integral player for the club within the next three years, and in his first uninterrupted season in 2008–09 he helped Barcelona achieve the first treble in Spanish football; that year, aged 22, Messi won his first Ballon d’Or. Three successful seasons followed, with Messi winning four consecutive Ballons d’Or, making him the first player to win the award four times and in a row.[10] During the 2011–12 season, he set the La Liga and European records for most goals scored in a single season, while establishing himself as Barcelona’s all-time top scorer. The following two seasons, Messi finished second for the Ballon d’Or behind Cristiano Ronaldo (his perceived career rival), before regaining his best form during the 2014–15 campaign, becoming the all-time top scorer in La Liga and leading Barcelona to a historic second treble, after which he was awarded a fifth Ballon d’Or in 2015. Messi assumed captaincy of Barcelona in 2018, and in 2019 he won a record sixth Ballon d’Or. Out of contract, he signed for Paris Saint-Germain in August 2021.

Messi holds the national record for appearances and is also the country’s all-time leading goalscorer. At youth level, he won the 2005 FIFA World Youth Championship, finishing the tournament with both the Golden Ball and Golden Shoe, and an Olympic gold medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics. His style of play as a diminutive, left-footed dribbler drew comparisons with his compatriot Diego Maradona, who described Messi as his successor. After his senior debut in August 2005, Messi became the youngest Argentine to play and score in a FIFA World Cup in 2006, and reached the final of the 2007 Copa América, where he was named young player of the tournament. As the squad’s captain from August 2011, he led Argentina to three consecutive finals: the 2014 FIFA World Cup, for which he won the Golden Ball, and the 2015 and 2016 Copa América, winning the Golden Ball in the 2015 edition. After announcing his international retirement in 2016, he reversed his decision and led his country to qualification for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, a third-place finish at the 2019 Copa América, and won the 2021 Copa América, while winning the Golden Ball and Golden Boot award for the latter. This achievement would see him receive a record seventh Ballon d’Or in 2021.

 

 

To top it all, Messi has endorsed sportswear company Adidas since 2006. According to France Football, he was the world’s highest-paid footballer for five years out of six between 2009 and 2014, and was ranked the world’s highest-paid athlete by Forbes in 2019 and 2022.[11] Messi was among Time’s 100 most influential people in the world in 2011 and 2012. In February 2020, he was awarded the Laureus World Sportsman of the Year, thus becoming the first footballer and the first team sport athlete to win the award. Later that year, Messi became the second footballer (and second team-sport athlete) to surpass $1 billion in career earnings.

Without doubt, you will agree with me that these two players football career are certainly promising looking at their little but outstanding beginnings. That’s not all, i will tell you what you want to hear–why they are they most talked about in football nowadays.

 

The reasons are because both of them have been outstanding in their respective ways; judging by their individual performance and by certain statistics over the years.

For Messi, he recently became the only player to achieve this feat of scoring more than twenty (20+) goals as well as racking more than twenty (20+) assists in 2022 which no other player has done so far.

 

Early this year, Messi became the only player to rack up 700 goals and swapping 300 assists, making it 1,000 goal contributions in football history.

 

Messi seem not to slow down even for a second as we see him surpassing Ronaldo’s non- penalty goal of 671, and overtakes him by setting a new feat of 672.

 

Nonetheless, in the just completed Argentina’s Friendly Matches, Messi surpassed Pele as the highest scoring player in South America, and becomes the best goals-scorer in Argentina’s history.

 

Meanwhile, the 38 years old Ronaldo at the other hand, remains a terrific goal scorer over the years despite his age advancement in which many believes he’s gradually getting old.

 

But to erase the trending assumption off the mind of his fans, he left everyone astonished after he netted and disquieted his haters that he still got it. By that single goal scored, he became the only player in football history to score 700 goals in club football.

 

Ronaldo has also set the pace and became the highest goal scorer in champions league, as well as becoming highest scoring player in international level.

 

 

There are also several characters and abilities in footballer which we must not overlook, especially if we must give them good remarks, which are:

 

Strength of the Duo

Cristiano Ronaldo is 1.85 meters tall and weighs 85 Kg as such might be expected to be a bully but on the way round, he rather prefers to go down rather than physically outshine an opposition, but if he must, be places the ball at the back of the net.

 

Lionel Messi on the other hand, has very good strength for someone that barely crosses 1.70 meters as their height. The Argentinian can shield defenders off the ball and can hold it with his back towards goal and anyone who has seen him would agree that he can resist opponents lunges and tackles towards his legs, and he can resist the hardest slides while remaining on his feet.

When these two instances are taken into consideration, both if them has more or less the same strength for physically defense, because Messi “over-perfoms” for his short build while Ronaldo underperforms for his huge one.

 

Top Speed / Acceleration

Lionel Messi is not as fast as you might think while talking about top speed, but his agility and acceleration in short spaces are simply the best in the world. Perhaps more quick than fast per say and can blow opponents away on pure burst.

Cristiano Ronaldo on the other hand is a sprinter. When in full speed, he’s one of the fastest players in the world. His acceleration is not that bad either, but he’s more faster than quick per say. If he’s in fourth gear sprinting, you just won’t catch him, but if he’s standing still, there’s a better chance of stopping him.

Both Messi and Ronaldo possesses a defender’s speed wise. But particularly, the Messi abuses them on short speed while Ronaldo wins on top speed.

 

Technique

Cristiano Ronaldo has magnificent technique for a player over 1.85 meters. He loves flicks and tricks and can do basically anything on the pitch when the ball is on his feet.

Lionel Messi on the other hand might be just be the top technician in the world with everything except his right foot, but other than that, he can control the ball in every situation with every single part of his body.

Therefore, with “one-footedness,” Messi might wins this battle because his techniques is a little better than Cristiano’s, which is still very close to a tie though.

 

Passing

Lionel Messi has established himself as a consistent passer and assister this past two seasons. He has also actively participated in Barcelona’s play creation., Especially when he actually wants to pass the ball. Sometimes, he gets greedy and just doesn’t pass when his teammates are open to make a play.

Cristiano Ronaldo on the other hand likes the ball to be in one man’s feet, which is definitely his feet. He has good skills and vision when passing the ball, but he just doesn’t like to share it at all and wants to finish the play himself most times.

 

Crossing

Cristiano Ronaldo benefited from his time in England to perfect his crossing technique. Although he’s not a corner kick taker because of his heading skills (more on that later), he’s a very good crosser and long passer. Sometimes, he prefers to take a shot at an odd angle on goal rather than crossing the ball.

 

Lionel Messi on the other hand becomes worse when the play is far away from him. When he was a winger, he never excelled at crossing the ball, neither did he like to take the corner kicks at Barcelona because he’s not proficient at long balls at all, which could be probably why Barcelona takes all those short corners.

 

Aerial Football / Headings

 

Lionel Messi is fantastic in the air for his short height and has scored lots of goals heading it in.But he is no way a dangerous force in that area even if he’s not as bad as his height would initally project him to be.

Cristiano Ronaldo on the other hand is very dangerous as a header and is also proficient at defending with his head. His 1.85 meter height helps him out and also has amazing positioning and very good jumping skills.

 

Shooting

 

Cristiano Ronaldo certainly enjoys launching “Ronaldo Rockets” on goal as much as he can at every game. That routine of his is partly because he has one of the world’s most powerful and deadliest shots; with both legs too, at least when he’s on target. But truth be told, even though he has a fantastic hard shot, most of them end up way off target. If he could improve his accuracy, imagine the possibilities.

 

Lionel Messi on the other hand prefers placing over power when he shoots, and even if he normally doesn’t take hard long shots on goal, he can do it as well, even if it’s not his strong suit. His strength is accuracy, and at that, he’s one of the world’s best, because it’s rare to see Messi’s shots end up way off target.

 

Free-kick taking / set pieces

 

Lionel Messi certainly has the touch to take the short free kicks, but the fact remains that he takes the long ones is just not cool. He doesn’t have the strength to take them and they either end up on the keepers hands or goes 50 feet above goal.

Cristiano Ronaldo on the other hand is one of the best free-kick takers today. His “folha seca rocket” and the show he performs before every shot are both widely feared.

 

 

Finishing

Cristiano Ronaldo has very good positioning and creates a lot of scoring opportunities, but his “all-power” approach doesn’t serve him well when he’s close to a goal. When he’s one-on-one against the keeper or with a clear-scoring chance, Cristiano is not as lethal as he should be. He’s actually deadlier when his chances aren’t that easy.

Lionel Messi on the other hand has become a lethal poacher in the area in Barcelona’s drawn out No. 9 role. He posses the ability to push in 40 goals with one-touch strikes inside in the past two years.

But when the play needs clinical finishing, Messi right there to punch it home every time. And when they’re inside that area and all the ball needs is some gentle, well-placed pushing, Messi is just the man while Cristiano is a long way behind him.

 

Dribbling

 

Lionel Messi is better at short, spaced one-on-one dribbling. His acceleration, technique and agility all come into play here, and it’s really the central characteristic that makes Messi who he is.

Cristiano Ronaldo on the other hand is very good dribbler that relies more on making his man miss trough tricks, and he’s definitely one of the best in the world in that regard. But he struggles when he’s standing still and shies away from tackles.

 

However, Cristiano’s a good dribbler in his own right, but Messi goes past him on this one.

 

Base on high recommendation, some notable footballers and coaches in the history of football have given their consent about the two world best players.

 

Bosses Comments

 

ZINEDINE ZIDANE

To note, Ronaldo won three Champions Leagues with Zidane as his boss.

Unsurprisingly, given that he was helped to three consecutive Champions Leagues triumphs by the man’s talents, Zizou has opted for Ronaldo as his greatest ever.

Zidane, who’s a legend of the sport, was also quick to diminish his own considerable talents in comparison to his former No7.

He said that: “Cristiano is the best. Messi is his rival and it’s the rivalry everyone wants to see. But Ronaldo is phenomenal. There are no words to describe him. He is much better than me even though I had a great career. He’s the greatest of all time.”

 

JOSE MOURINHO;

Ronaldo won the first of his two LaLiga titles under his compatriot in 2012, scoring an astonishing 60 goals throughout the course of the season. But despite the success that Ronaldo possesses helped him to achieve that year, Mourinho cannot be swayed.

While out of work last year, the 57-year-old said: “I think it’s unfair to both of them when somebody says this one is better than the other one. I think they are just different. When you go to Messi and Ronaldo, I think it’s just unfair to compare the players. The only thing I can say is that when I had Ronaldo on my side, I was a very happy man. And when I had to play against Messi – and also against Ronaldo because I played against Ronaldo a few times – I had to think a lot to try and help my team have chances to succeed.”

 

PEP GUARDIOLA

Messi won an astonishing 14 trophies in four years under Guardiola.

 

Messi and Guardiola was an astonishing, trophy-guzzling combination between 2008 and 2012, as the pair hoovered up 14 cups together at Barcelona.

 

The now-Manchester City manager’s love for Messi has endured the test of time, and after his favourite Argentine was pipped to the 2016 Ballon d’Or by Ronaldo – he was clear in his assessment.

 

According to Guardiola, “Messi is the best, he is definitely the best. He knows how to play, score and make the other players play. He is always there. With all the respect to all the players, first to Ronaldo – congratulations to him for the award – I think Messi is on another level.”

 

 

ARSENE WENGER

Wenger found it difficult to split the pair. The former Arsenal manager saw both players terrorize his Gunners side.

Ronaldo was part of an astonishing Manchester United attacking triumvirate alongside Carlos Tevez and Wayne Rooney that regularly tore Arsenal apart as they romped to three consecutive league titles between 2006 and 2009.

Wenger also saw his side knocked out of the Champions League by a Messi-inspired Barcelona in 2010, 2011 an 2016.

The 70 years old Frenchman, 70, said: “Artistically, Messi is a guy who can give the final ball, so he’s maybe more a creative player than Ronaldo. Ronaldo is more a finisher, better in the air, more athletic, and Messi is the more artistic. So basically you are always tempted a little bit more by a player like Messi.”

 

SIR ALEX FERGUSON

Ronaldo still has a lot of affection for ‘father figure’ Ferguson.

Sir Alex Ferguson brought Ronaldo to England in 2003, nurturing the talented teenager into the world’s most expensive player when he departed for Real Madrid six years later.

Speaking in 2016, Ferguson said: “Now don’t get me wrong, Messi is a fantastic player, it’s like he’s wearing slippers when he controls the ball.

“But here, for me, is the difference. Messi is a Barcelona player. But Ronaldo could play for Stockport County and score a hat trick. He has everything. He can shoot with both feet, head the ball, he’s as brave as a lion.”

 

 

 

DIEGO SIMEONE

Simeone has had to set up against his compatriot many a time.

The fiery Atletico Madrid manager has spent several years trying to poop the pair’s parties as manager of the lesser-fancied of LaLiga’s perennial contenders.

A leaked WhatsApp message in 2018 appeared to suggest that the Argentine actually preferred Ronaldo to his compatriot Messi. But he later clarified his comments in a press conference.

He said that: “If I had to choose between Messi and Ronaldo then most likely I would choose Messi. Yes I said [Ronaldo] on the video, but the conversation was between me and [assistant] German Burgos, talking about football as everyone talks about it. When I talked about Messi and Ronaldo it wasn’t from the perspective of who is the best in the world.

“I just meant that if you have the chance to sign one of them for a normal club, with normal players, Ronaldo would probably fit in better. But with Messi, surrounded by great players, Messi is better than Ronaldo.”

 

No doubt and leaving you with none, after taking you through these fantastic players achievements since their inception in the football world. They have both stared immense attention on their fans and still not showing any sign of relenting anytime soon.

 

No phrase fits them batter than Genius of all times!

 

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