Made I do understand the point, the problem is that it is not a valid point, cause Ronaldo never improved his physical and technical game beyond 96/97. That was his utmost observable peak in his entire career. His stunt with Barca and Copa 97 stands out above anything he's done in his career. People don't talk about his WC02 and La Liga 03 in the same light as his 97 year. For a good reason. And Romario still showed to be at the same level as post matured R9 beyond 97/98, both technique wise as with physical ability with the ball at his feet and was still scoring at top level even beyond age 30+. And this not only can be measured statistically but it can also be observed by watching both players beyond 1998 periods. Do you need evidence for the above claim I just made? Look no further than FIFA confederation Cup in 1997. Romario at age 32 still (slightly) outperformed a peak and prime R9 at age 21 with goals and overall game to become MVP of the tournament. Pay attention here, a post prime and past-his-best aged 32 Romario still matched a prime and peak aged 21 Ronaldo. Also, years after, Romario at age 36 became WC02 qualifiers runner up top scorer along side Rivaldo with 8 goals. To score 8 goals, in WC02 qualifiers campaign and only 1 goal shy of winning the top scorer title means you have got to have been still playing at that top level. Romario WC02 qualifiers beat no other than the likes of Batistuta, Zamorano, strikers who were a lot younger than him. I do agree, that up till Barca 97 he was still in his developing period as a player overall. Still unusually young and honing to mature into a complete player. Up till then he was filling the role of a pure CF. I agree! But, there is one single detail and problem you seem to miss. After, 96/97, when he reached his utmost career peak with Barca, Ronaldo never really took his game beyond that performance shown in 96/97. His capabilities never got beyond his Barca season. This in part might have been to his injuries and surgeries. But we will never know for sure. Fact is, his game didn't improve further beyond that we seen in 96/97. And no other season beyond 96/97 perhaps even 98, emulated his Barca performance as far as physical capabilities and technique goes. There was still improvement made on his mental development, which we have observed improve in his later years (WC02 and La Liga 03). But his physical game was never better than 96/97. So the point you tried to make is unsubstantiated. If we had seen a real observable and measurable improvement in his development beyond that 96/97 season, e.g. getting better with technique and athleticism than i would have agreed with your point. But the fact is there is no observable bettering in his game beyond 96/97 with club and NT. His Barca 96/97 game remains his best club performance and his Copa America 97 game remains his best performance with NT. IOn a different note, it is the norm to expect the average maturity of strikers to reach around their peak years. More or less around age 25-28. Than there will be an observable gradual decline in athleticism and performance overall in the average player. Which brings us to the next point and conclusion, R9 is one of the rare superstar players in history whom maturity and prime did not coincide with his peak years. His peak came years before the average age most players reach maturity. And I suspect (always have) that this might have been detrimental in his development In short words, the one very thing that made R9 famous and into a legend (his unusual early career peak) was the one very thing that cut his true potential to reach Pele level short. If you know what I mean. Physical capacity is not all. Mental goes hand in hand with it. You can kick the ball and dribble like no other, which he did. But if you lack mental maturity, than you will run out of steam eventually, which did happen as well to him.
We will agree to disagree Ronaldo reached an all round level of influence in his first two seasons for Inter Milan that Romario did not reach You can point to beirhoff outscoring him but you would never hold it against Lionel Messi that he was out scored by Diego Forlan in La Liga 08/09 his first ballon D’Or season. Paolo Maldini May of called Romario the king of penalty area but he called R9 the best player he ever faced PERIOD “The best ever I played against was Maradona," Maldini told Sky Sport Italia. He is the player who has put me in the most difficulty on the pitch. but even Ronaldo during his first two years at Inter was a phenomenon” Ronaldo is the hardest attacker I’ve ever had to face. He was impossible to stop.” — Alessandro Nesta Listen to Lillian Thuram and Marcel desaily talk about R9 97/98 He was unplayable in Italy even with the stringent man marking of the best defences in the world Romario can never be compared to R9 in Italy (and only a handful of players could so don’t take it badly) R9 1996/97 for Barcelona was just a spectacular athlete with some great ball skills and good but not spectacular close control dribbling(many times opting for sheer pace to beat a man rather dribble past him) R9 in 97/98 was the most devastating dribbler in Serie A in living memory Above Roberto Baggio,Diego maradona He could weave past players like Lionel Messi,do skills like Ronaldinho but running at a speed of 100 miles per hour He could also beat a player with sheer pace like a Henry but had the physical strength to also hold of defenders Just think he destroyed 3 of the 5 best leagues in Europe by the time he was 21 years old Was a MVP in a World Cup,Copa America during this time He also won the uefa best player in Europe award in 97/98 despite not even playing in the champions league His performance in the uefa Cup Was so devastating they made an exception for him No player in history won this award while playing in the uefa Cup to put this achievement into some much needed perspective 14:34-17:15 playmaking
I cannot continue responding to your usual fanboyism and hooliganism. Nike should hire you since you are exceptionally good at spreading propaganda. Would be cheap too! lets agree to disagree, otherwise we will go on going round circles into infinity
Propaganda only because you can’t refute a single point I’ve made 1.)R9 as a pure CF scored at the same GPG rate as Romario in La Liga In overall competitions not just including La Liga R9 had a demonstrably better season FACT NOT FICTION 2.)in R9s peak season 1997/98 he was widely considered to be the greatest all round attacking threat since Diego maradona Romario was never reached the level of a player who was considered as one of the most complete forwards in history Romario can only claim dominion over the 18 yard box,outside of it there were at least 30 better attacking players It is not a conspiracy theory but rather a fact that prime R9 spent more time in the centre of the pitch,building attacks and ball carrying which a player like Romario couldn’t do because he was criticised even in his prime for being a lazy player Ie a player who would go missing for vast periods of time then pop up with a decisive goal or assist Your unswerving allegiance to Romario is preventing you from admitting that he is only comparable to R9 as a finisher (actually maybe he is even better) Prime R9 was much more than the G+A metric that you insist on comparing him to a pure finisher which essentially was what Romario was Because Romario could play the occasional through ball,or occasionally drop deep (which In fact happened more often in vasco de gama after his prime )does not mean he did so as frequently as R9 did for inter Milan Below are some examples of preassisted goals R9 scored in his prime season 1997/98 R9 creating a higher percentage of his own goals than Romario is also a fact and not fiction Romario could score technically aesthetic goals and his finishing technique was more refined than R9 I agree with that but there is so much more to being a greater scorer and even more to being a greater player Prime R9 I’m Europe had a superior gpg ratio at club level between 96-98 than prime Romario in Europe had in 92-94 R9 also scored a substantial amount of his goals in a league recognised as the best of it’s time (in terms of quality and not hype) In R9s best club season he was recognised as Serie A player of the season 1997/98 World Cup golden ball1998 Best player in all UEFA competitions 1997/98(including champions league and Uefa Cup) And he did not top score in any of those competitions In the World Cup he was outscored by Suker In Serie A outscored by Bierhoff In the champions league by Del piero and in the uefa Cup by Guivarc'h we can infer from this R9 was considered at the time to be the best player in the world for reasons not necessarily associated with his ability to score but his ALL ROUND INFLUENCE was of a higher standard than any other forward of his time
More of the same fanboyism and hooliganism I can't refute your points? I wasn't interested to waist more of my time to this cause you are too biased to be receptive to any valid points presented to you. You didn't even respond to most points I made to begin with. Your problem is that you just want to have the last word. Your pre-disposition against certain players and your idolatry towards certain players is evident, and it dictates what statistics you choose and how you interpret it. I'm not going to continue any more with this topic, not because you made any good point I cannot refute, but because I am convinced you will continue with your usual biased disposition. Be that a disposition against Romario or Ronaldinho, Baggio or Iniesta, no matter the facts presented to you, you will always argue back for the sake of arguing back. You have been like this for more than a year now. In the end, you believe in what you want to believe and have a good one.
Something that caught my attention in your post which I mentioned about Mbappe is that some players reach their maturity level at an earlier age. It doesn't mean that they will increasingly get better at the same rate as another player that matures later. I had this same exact argument with @carlito86. People expect Mbappe to be the greatest player of all time winning 6 ballon d'ors. The fact is when I look at his game, he struggles and does not shine against tight defenses. Against Liverpool, against Napoli, and against Real Madrid. Not in 1 game. And people talk about his unreal performance against a slow Argentinian defense with a ton of space as evidence he will win 6 ballon d'ors. He is good no question, but for a 19 yr old, his game is unusually mature. And like R9, there is nothing that says at the age of 28 with no injuries he would be scoring 60-70 goals a season as some people may wish to believe. It's something that we can't automatically presume. Wayne Rooney matured as a professional at the age of 16!!! A feat that neither Messi nor Ronaldo achieved. People were calling Rooney ''Pele 2''. But he was never considered arguably the best in the world. However, an immature Ronaldo at 18 ended up being arguably a top 10 all time, who at that age was considered less of a player than Quaresma. And believe it or not, you have the English National team coach making statements like 'Rashford was more mature than Cristiano Ronaldo' at the same age. Are we supposed to believe that Rashford will outdo Ronaldo because of this??!! Ridiculous!!!!
This is what I meant. Mbappe's case underpins the same phenomenon seen in R9 and other unusual players who will peak their careers way before maturity. But I always believed that because of these players unusual young age that most fans and media will perceive these players as potential GOAT in the making. But fact is that once past their peaks, very little is observed in terms of further development, both physical as their game overall. In case of R9, the only part of his development that can be observed was his mental strength which did improve a lot after those injuries and his WC98 final fiasco. He grew mentally strong while his physical and technical side remained more or less the same. Pele was an exception to this phenomena in that he grew beyond his peak both technically, in his game, and mentally. What was the cause that permitted Pele to be different to Mbappe and R9, who in turn did not grow beyond their unusual early peaks, is a mystery to me. Was it the "era" he played in, or was it plain luck on his side? I dunno! In any case, the problem with fanatics like Carlito is that they are too emotionally attached to their idols to see these things objectively. Like evangelists defending their convictions to the death even in the face of evidence pointing otherwise. I have a question for @carlito86 , if what Carlito claims, with so much eulogy, is true about R9 being such an influential player to his teams like he did in his recent post, than how come did R9 win only 1 single league title with clubs in his entire career? He should have won at least one or two more league titles if he was such an influence to his teams. He played for the biggest of clubs in Europe for 14 years. And yet, his supposed influence as a player earned him only 1 single major league title. And he did this while playing for Galacticos. Other, players like Romario, Rivaldo and Ronaldinho won many more league titles than he did. And the same can be said of his NT success. Take Rivaldo out of NT98 and (Ronaldinho) NT02, and Brazil does not even reach the final of these WCs. Look at the WC02 QF match vs England. R9 was completely shut down. Rivaldo and Ronaldinho scored the match savers and pressed England all throughout the match when R9 could hardly be seen touching the ball. No Rivaldo, no Ronaldinho means Brazil would have not past that QF and the outcome of the WC would have looked very different. Also, Rivaldo was much more influential for Barca's league titles while he was there than R9 for any of his clubs successes or lack thereof in any given season. And Ronaldinho was clearly the best club player of all his Brazilian contemporaries (Romario, R9, Rivaldo, and perhaps even Kaka). Yet, R9 gets ranked by fans and non fans way above his contemporaries while having achieved actually less as far as being influential to his club successes. It does my head in! Now let me be clear what I think of R9. I think R9 was one of the greatest of strikers and of players overall of all times. Yet, I wouldn't no how to rank him though. Perhaps ranking these players doesn't even matter that much cause they were all great players to enjoy watching. However, I am sure he (R9) belongs in the same ranking level as Romario, Rivaldo and Ronaldinho. Cause he did not achieve substantially more (if any at all) than the aforementioned guys in terms of technique, titles and influence on his teams. Yet, his fans make him appear to be greater than what he actually was. Some like Carlito, will go as far as producing a truck load of statistics, posters and videos to make the case. But couldn't we do the same for Romario, Rivaldo and Ronaldinho? Of course we can. This is my view.
This is not a argument but rather an emotionally driven rant The argument that R9 cannot be considered better than Romario because of a lack of league titles is one of the most ridiculous things you’ve said Ibrahimovic with twelve league titles in 4 different leagues should be a top 20 all timer going by this logic And Clarence seedorf with 4 champions league titles with 3 different teams or gento with 6 European cups should also be considered to be top 20 all timers Winning titles or top scorer awards without discussing the context is misleading We know as a FACT that inter Milan were cheated out of the 1997/98 Serie a title The famous match between them and juventus where R9 was blatantly hacked down by luliano and the referee refused to give the penalty but gave juventus a penalty literally seconds later Many years later the ref conceded that he made a mistake and admitted he should’ve given R9 the penalty There was a big furore in italy as a result that resulted in physical fights in the parliament and it was a highly contentious issue the context of this match was both teams entered level on points with only 4 league matches to go Whoever won stood in pole position for the title There is no doubt in the mind of many that Inter Milan were cheated of the title and to be honest it wouldn’t be a surprise considering the influence of Luciano Moggi a mafiosi/juventus director who was directly implicated in match fixing and bribing referees R9 should really have won 2 league titles in Europe Between 1999 and 2001 he missed 635 days through injury almost 2 years of his physical prime Doctors gave him a very slim chance to be able to play again Within this context of injuries,missing out on a champions league title because he came to Real Madrid a season too late,being cheated out of a league title in Italy R9 had a greater club career in Europe than Romario and at international level there is no competition(R9 wins hands down with two impressive performances in two world cups being the best player in one and top 3 in the other,a great performance in the Copa America,remains the record World Cup all time goalscorer for his country) Personally I prefer unlike you to focus on who was actually the better footballer but I only brought this up because you insist R9 had a mediocre trophy cabinet at club level while completely omitting the context of his club career or being completely ignorant about the disadvantages he faced in which case you aren’t even qualified to talk about his career
Emotionally driven than rant? Can you show me where the emotion is when asking a simple question? Stop projecting yourself onto me. Because you are emotional it doesn't mean others who disagree with you are. Interesting to see you summing up Ibra's and Seedorf's leauge titles. You missed the point I made about his lack of league titles. Yet again, you will instead going off on a tangent with irrelevant arguments that don't answer the question. It doesn't matter what Ibra or others did. The question is not what others have done but what R9 has done to become so influential to his teams. That Ibra or Seedorf won a gazillion league titles is not relevant to the point I made. All legendary GOAT players who were influential to their teams they played won many more team titles than R9 did. If he was as influential as you claimed than his 1 single league title while playing for super team Galacticos doesn't add up to being influential. Overall, Raul was more influential to Madrid than R9 was. And this is an observable measure. You said he was such an influential player to his teams. How did you measure his influence, did his teams perform better or did his team win more titles while he was playing for them? Well, where are his team titles? I can only guess what player's name you will throw into the debate next as a diversionary tactic
Are you literally brain dead I just spent time explaining to you R9 was robbed of a league titie by Luciano Moggi in his debut season playing for inter Milan https://www.google.co.uk/amp/www.fc...-da-sistema-corrotto-moggi-e-il-5-maggio/amp/ https://www.google.co.uk/amp/inbedwithmaradona.com/journal/2016/5/19/the-great-and-the-controversial-serie-a-1997-1998?format=amp Romario did not have to suffer the injustices of being robbed of league titles by corrupt officials and referees R9 was the best player in La Liga 96/97 and lost the titie by a few points In 1997/98 he was the best player in Serie A and had the titie robbed from him In 2002/03 he was definitely Real Madrid’s best player in La Liga and won the league Bottom line He should definitely have two league titles in Europe which is not bad for a player who played most of his physical prime with ruptured knee caps Real Madrid not winning much post 2003 has as much to do with players like midfield destroyer Makelele,Fernando hierro ,morientes,McManaman leaving the club(major figures of real Madrid’s dominance in the European Cup) Also Rauls dramatic decline in form Between 03/04 and 05/06 he only scored 32 goals in all competitions compared to scoring 32 goals in one season during 2000/01(probably deserved a Ballon D’Or for this If im perfectly honest) Players like Luis figo are also to blame.shifting the blame on one player when we are talking about a team sport is completely nonsensical Once again you are unaware of the context of real Madrid’s decline in which case you aren’t qualified AT ALL to speak on the matter The galacticos was a failed project,so many superstars,so many egos was never going to work out for long enough Del bosque was the glue that held them together.his outward appearance is that of a gentle figure but he spoke with authority and his players listened But guess what..he left aswell Flo Pérez was solely interested in the commercial success of his club through buying marketable superstars like beckham who could sell shirts when he could’ve got dinho for cheaper but according to Pérez he was to ugly Ultimately Ronaldinho payed back Barcelona with titles and beckham will be remembered for T-shirt and underware sales
You keep on insulting me with line like "Are you literally brain dead" in the above posts above. None of the above is relevant to the debate at hand about who was the most influential of the two. You claim that R9 was robbed off the season yet the post here doesn't provide any reliable source or statistic or article or interview or method to draw the conclusion that he was robbed off his season. And all of your previous post don't provide any proof either that his season was robbed. And even if you are correct and R9 was indeed robbed off the season it is still completely irrelevant to the point of discussion. Let me remind what the discussion/debate is all about. It is about who out of the two players were more influential and thus "key" in their respective best season, that is 93/94 vs 96/97. R9 may have scored 46 goals while Romario scored only 30. Yet, the point you are missing is that a lot of Romario's goals and assists came in the most crucial of rounds in the race for the title. Whereas R9's goals were staggered in the less crucial rounds for the race to the title. Against mid table and bottom table teams. This is observable and easily verified. And the following underpins the most important factor in this debate: It doesn't matter if R9 scored 16 goals more or 32 goals more or 100 goals more or 1.345 million goals more than Romario. It doesn't matter the superior numbers on R9's side. Cause It is not a question of who did score more. It is a question of who was the better player to their respective teams in their respective career best season. That is the core of the debate! And the better player is by default the one who is the most influential player for winning the most important and difficult of titles by being clutch in the critical rounds of the league season and therefore dictate the outcome of the most important title of the season "La Liga" ! Not the Copa Del Rey or Supercup who are side shows. Ronaldo was the better goal scorer when you take all overall goal tally combined for the entire season. And that is a great feat in on itself. Was R9 season legendatry? Yes it was. But that is not the point of the discussion. It is about who was the more influential player and not about who was the most prolific goalscorer. Romario was the more influential player when you look at "where" and "when" his goal and assist came in the most critical of rounds/matches in the season. Do you research properly and read and watch season 93/94 and you will see for your own. Carlito never saw La Liga 93/94 life. All he knows is drawn out of a few youtube video clips summarising 93/94. He then looks at 46 goals for R9 and 30 goals for Romario and draws the conclusion that scoring 16 goals more is more impressive a feat while ignoring the fact that the majority of the 16 extra goals of R9 meant little to the result of Barca 96/97 season success, and ignoring the fact that Romario's lesser goal tally overall had a huge impact on the league title and therefore was more clutch for Barca 93/94 season. He does the same mistake when he rates Cristiano Ronaldo, the greatest stat padder of his generation. No I expect you next post will start with the usual insult line "Is your brain dead" @ko242 .
If you can’t understand that 1996/97 wasn’t R9s best season than this is a pointless conversation R9 of 1997/98 was his best version according to every single critic who followed him in Italy According to defenders Thuram,nesta,maldini,,desaily etc who faced him Even Sandro Mazzola an all time great of Italian football explicitly mentioned the R9 of Inter Milan till his injury in 99 was unmatched by anything he saw before or since in Italy and he saw maradona,platini,boniek,baggio,falcao,laudrup,passarella,mattheus and hundreds of other great players who played in Italy since the 60s You are making a fundamental mistake Romario was a player fundamentally defined by goals+assists in his prime And R9 wasn’t accept it or not isn’t my problem but it’s the facts in 1997/98 R9 never won a single top scorer award not in Serie A,Coppa Italia,uefa Cup orWorld Cup He was the best though and that was clear for every single person to see I’ll leave you and you fellow revisionists to masturbate about who scored more open play goals,who scored more or less penalties Nobody cares.scoring goals was only one part of R9s skillset You cannot quantify the significance of magic in a players performance.if so what really separated any prime season of maradona compared to platini it certainly wasn’t something tangible (They were pretty much equal in stats at every level including club and international) Maradona had that extra quality (x factor if you like )that is not captured in statistics that other players did not have R9 like maradona before him also had that little bit of extra quality in Italy no one had Note: No major European league in history can claim to have fielded more technical players than Serie A and it’s not even close Even amongst this level of competition R9 stood unmatched by anyone Ronaldo was nicknamed the phenomenon in Italy not in Spain So it is completely irrelevant what your saying about who was more important in La Liga when that wasn’t even R9s best season. R9 as a CF in 1996/97 outscored romario by a margin of 16 goals and he only played 2 more games(and he was 7 years younger) R9 as a CF,SS and FW for intermilan 1997/98 outscored,out dribbled all the while playing a deeper role than any version of Romario Romario never played these roles in his prime so a direct comparison cannot be made it is as simple as that. Prime R9 1997/98 will be directly compared to versatile strikers like Eusebio who could play as a second striker or even Van Basten who was a very capable wide striker delivering crosses for Ajax or even weah for PSG and Milan(playmaking striker who scored less goals but created a lot via his dribbling,combination and interplay and was a very effective support striker) Romario will be compared to strikers like muller,greaves,Vavá,linekar,RVN ie players who’s starting position was in the box and who’s influence rarely exceeded this area Romario is near the top of this list but lacked mullers big game presence and mentality so he is underneath
https://www.xtratime.org/forum/71-f...-etoo-ronaldinho-3.html#/topics/178837?page=1 Real time views on Ronaldinhos greatest season(2005/06)
A comprehensive look At Cristiano ronaldos standout season 2011/2012 I’ve included footage from all levels including NT,La Liga and the champions league It was the highest scoring season in his entire career with 69 goals in 2011/12 for his club and NT DBS calcio awarded him a La Liga average score of 7.503 which is one of the top 5 highest scores ever recorded in Spain(the other 4 belong to non other than Lionel Messi) In the European championships he started slow but to be fair he was unlucky hitting the post around half a dozen times He caught fire against the Netherlands and put on a performance for the ages (arguably his best ever for the NT) In this season and also 2012/13 CR was at the pinnacle of his game, ruthlessly consistent and Decisive he operated with a free role during which he combined goat level scoring and elite wing play/crossing From set pieces,right foot,left foot,headers,from distance(up to 35-40 yards)ronaldo was completely devastating Never seen a player like him that combined these qualities to that kind of level(except Pele but even then I don’t recall seeing footage of him playing on either flank and whipping in world class crosses-I think he(Pele)was more creative in the middle of the pitch and a more gifted/effective through baller) @PuckVanHeel @ko242 @Edhardy @Bavarian14 @PDG1978 @celito
It's hilarious to think how many more he could've assisted if it wasn't for Benzema at the receiving end of the ball
Don't hate on Benzema. He actually has more non-PK goals this year (Ramos takes them for Real) than CR does. Obviously he's not an elite finisher but he is a damn fine player.
this year,this season whatever you’ve missed the point The comp I posted was of ronaldos 11/12 season and Bavarian pointed out what is clearly obvious If benzema had put away even half the one on one chances ronaldo created in that season he’d easily have 25-30 assists Ronaldo and benzema have played in totally different competitions this season Ronaldo has been demonstrably stronger in the league with 14 goals+7 assists and many of those “easy” penalties have been game deciders and we know how many players choke in those kind of situations I don’t want to be drawn into this silly conversation of penalty and non penalty goals especially when it bears no relevance at all to the point Bavarian raised Stop creating red herring arguments because you are incapable of digesting facts that pertain to ronaldos greatness as a footballer. Die hard Messi fans like yourself clearly suffer from a major inferiority complex I’ve never heard you respond to a poster who claims Suarezs misses many chances created by Messi by saying don’t insult Suarez. GTFO and don’t waste my time mate
LOL at this post... inferiority complex. This thread isn't even about Messi so I don't know why you're bringing him up. People resort to personal attacks when they have no arguments. Benzema gets heavily criticized by Madridistas but he's not a bad player by any stretch. Overall one of the best 9's of this generation no doubt about it. That was my point, not to hate on Ronaldo who is obviously a way better player than Benzema. I just threw that point out there to put the Benzema struggles in context for you the CR fanboy haha
Continuing on: Cristiano ronaldos 2012/13 season I’ve included footage from NT and club matches From my own perspective this was his last season as a hybrid winger/forward In 2013/14 Carlo ancelotti converted him into a wide striker in a 4-3-3 formation(alongside Gareth bale and karim benzema) and consequently became more goal focused and less involved in build up @Edhardy @PuckVanHeel @ko242 @Bavarian14 @AD78 @greatstriker11 @PDG1978 @Tropeiro @PMFmdf @poetgooner
Lollll Good thing I wasn’t around for the start of this thread. Haven’t read any of the 14 page worth of comments because that’s 14 pages too long to answer a very simple question. Cristiano Ronaldo is the All-Time Best Player in the most difficult competition in the sport’s history, the Champions League. He didn’t get this title from scoring all his goals in the group stage. He got it for feats like the season he demolished 3 of the best teams in Europe in Bayern, Atletico and Juventus with multiple hat tricks and the like. There’s actually a story Kobe Bryant likes to tell where he states the years ago, Ronaldinho told him that this kid at Barcelona was going to be the best player ever. That kid was Messi. Cristiano Ronaldo became the Best CL Player of All Time. For his national team, they’ve advanced farther in competitions since he started playing than they had in their entire history prior to his playing. As captain, he led them to their first and only title. Very representative of his impact in this success, is that of the only finals Portugal has ever reached in its history (Euro 04 and Euro 16), Cristiano Ronaldo was there in both semi-finals to give Portugal the lead. At 19 and at 31. If you want to win a game of football, there is no choice between CR7 and Ronaldinho, in their primes or otherwise. Anyone that believes Ronaldinho would be more likely to win you a football game over a prime CR7 is so mesmerized by his technique and playing style that it’s too sad to even elaborate on further. He was a showman. A very effective showman. If that’s what you like in a player, I don’t blame you, it’s fun to watch. If the question is on who is the better footballer IE who will more likely win you a football game, you are at best bias and at worst, the definition of an idiot if you believe Ronaldinho is the best choice. Simply what it is. CR7 has and will leave a mark on the game that Ronaldinho never could have, no matter how long his prime lasted. One of the reasons It didn’t last that long is because it wasn’t that high to begin with. There’s actually a funny story that Kobe Bryant likes to tell where he states the years ago, Ronaldinho told him that this kid at Barcelona was going to be the best player ever. That kid was Messi. Cristiano Ronaldo became the Best CL Player of All Time competing against the player that Ronaldinho himself knew was on a completely other level relative to himself. How this spans 14 pages or why the question warranted a thread in the first place should be a case study in itself.