Cristiano Ronaldo ~ Your Favorite Player Is So Much Better!! Thread

So, let me really make sure I understood you correctly. Did Messi touch the ball less in deep positions in 2009-10 as compared to other years? Is that what you are saying?

"If Messi is dropping deep less and is playing more on the shoulder of the last defender than other years, then he’ll have fewer overall touches (which he did, in 2009-2010) and, in that scenario, a lower number of touches in deep areas could easily look darker on a heat map because heat maps are relative a player’s own number of touches and the times he was playing further up weren’t as often producing touches."

Just want to make sure I clarify this assertion.

 

I don’t have specific data on his number of touches by specific zones in that season compared to others, so I cannot make any particular claim about that with complete confidence. But considering that he made fewer passes per 90 minutes in those years than any other season we have data for and fewer passes as a percent of his team’s overall passing numbers than any season we have data for except 2013-2014 (and it was significantly lower than most years), I certainly wouldn’t say that heat maps tell us he played deeper than other seasons, since heat maps are not on some universal scale and we know he had a good deal fewer touches overall that season so the scale for his heat map that season is different than others. This seems to be something you’re fundamentally unable to comprehend, and it is a really important concept for you to wrap your head around if discussion is going to continue on this subject.

You are also still ignoring the three points I listed in my prior posts. Address them. I keep repeating them and you keep ignoring them, which I think is pretty telling.

 

I asked a simple question. You obfuscated the dialogue by finding ways to discredit the heatmaps with various arguments. And made the claim that by your (phony) methods, could estimate participation in deeper zones through % of team's passes and other ancillary calculations/numbers and then developed arguments and threw out my points on that basis.

So I ask again, did Messi have fewer touches in deeper zones in 2009/10 as you claimed? Yes or no. I just want it to be very clear.

 

I love that CR7 fanboys are still trying to argue a moot point. Bro, this was already decided and its not even close. Its over. Messi is now solidified in history as one of the GOATS. Your boy is not.

 

This is sophistry. I’m not going to make a definitive statement about an empirical question I simply do not have conclusive data on. What I was explaining to you is that heat maps don’t actually tell us what you’re asserting. The point was to explain to you the flaws in how you think heat maps should be read, not to make any particular point about Messi’s number of touches in specific zones in 2009-2010 (which is something that is, at best, tangential to the actual discussion). If you have data on that tangential question that is not just you misinterpreting a heat map, then feel free to present it rather than playing childish games. I am not aware of any such information and was assuming you made the statement you made based on your lack of understanding of how to read and contextualize heat maps, and I was therefore trying to explain how heat maps work to you again.

And again, I will repeat: Address the three points I made here: https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/c...h-better-thread.2011827/page-24#post-41747435. These are very fundamental points that completely dismantle your argument, and you just refuse to address them and instead are engaging in tangential sophistry.

 

No you've developed a fallacious argument based on creating an irrelevant, unproved "association" - that the percentage of a team's passes/touches is a reflection of field depth.
This is the assertion you made.
This is how you've been slowly trying to chip away and discrediting heat maps that disprove you (more on this later).
On that basis, you've repeatedly argued that Messi played deeper as time went on (as in more participatory in deeper zones). You explicitly said that based on this method of yours, you estimate that he was the "least deep" in 2009-10 - directly contradicting my assertion.

So I ask again:

Did Messi play the least deep in 2009-10 as compared to later years where his touch participation increased?

I am a direct and straightforward conversationalist. I would appreciate if we could work through this in a clear, non-obfuscating manner.

 

I’ll answer that question once you respond to the points that I first made before that, that you keep blatantly ignoring despite me explicitly asking you to respond to them in every post.

 

I've read most of it, but we've discussed most of it and the few nuances that we didn't address are more arguments on technicality and not particularly valid points.
Like your first point is just completely off-mark, inaccurate and illogical.
The second is also silly - we were making career comparisons, so the discussion was career centric. I spoke of Ronaldo's transition. He only truly played as a CF in 2017-18 and did not win a BDor. The whole point does not make sense and is not productive.
Your vocaculary is strange - you talk about "helping Ronaldo". Ronaldo does not need defending. I do not particularly care about changing your perception or convince anybody here of anything. Neither am I a Ronaldo fanboy - I have criticized him multiple times!
I just rather provide accurate points of discussion.

So answer the question, so we can actually build a frame of discussion step by step. I need to work on keeping you focused on the topic, instead of scatter-brained.

 

These are plainly not adequate or good faith responses, so you need to go back to the drawing board.

You simultaneously argue Ronaldo plays deeper than Messi while also having argued that, while Messi was providing midfield overloads, Ronaldo was providing more value by sticking on the defensive line and making runs and forcing the defensive line back. These are manifestly inconsistent arguments. And now you just address that inconsistency by vaguely saying that pointing it out is “completely off-mark, inaccurate and illogical” without any elaboration. Obviously inadequate. Given the inadequacy of your response, this point is all but accepted by you.

Talking about Ronaldo’s “transition,” you are being as vague and obfuscatory as possible about exactly what you’re saying. You seem to be obfuscating here by vaguely suggesting it’s just limited to 2017-2018 (and by the way: He did win the Ballon D’or then, because half of that season was in 2017 and he won the Ballon D’or for the 2017 calendar year). This isn’t consistent with you having repeatedly previously said Ronaldo had this different role for the last 2-3 years at Real Madrid. But anyways, should we discount the 2015-2016 and 2016-2017 touch/pass data for Ronaldo or not? And should 2017-2018 (and those other two seasons as well) count for purposes of tallying up his goalscoring? You’re trying to obfuscate your way out of the obvious fact that you’re wanting to count these seasons for some purposes and not for others. You need to be very clear about what years are valid to compare to Messi and what years aren’t, and that view needs to be consistent across all arguments you make (as well as consistent with your prior statements about Ronaldo’s role change).

 

I did not claim those were developed replies. I simply do not have the bandwidth to entertain most of those points that have either been in some way discussed/addressed, are obviously false to you, etc. I'm not really sure you believe some of the things you say, so I don't waste my time going in circles about certain points.

You can simultaneously be a threat and play deeper. These are not mutually exclusive concepts - I'm not sure why I have to explain this? Ronaldo played on the wing. So he is providing width as an outlet - this is not a directly analogous situation to Messi as a CF occupying deeper positions relative to the defensive line. There is no disruption of the offensive structure and spacing of the team - on the contrary. My point about Messi is that the false 9 position as interpreted by Messi comes with its advantages and disadvantages and that Messi was deployed as such because he cannot otherwise play a traditional CF role - reducing spacing on the field.
But Ronaldo played in traditional roles - wide midfielder, left forward, center forward, albeit with varying degrees of positional liberty.
If you look at Messi circa 2010 - he was playing the same position, but his motor and speed allowed him to produce many runs threatening mid-block lines and sometimes trailing runs in the box. That aspect of his game regressed after his energy and his conditioning worsened.

 

As for the Messi 2009-2010 thing, the data on the percent of his team’s passes certainly is suggestive of him not playing as deep a role that season. That’s also my recollection from watching it as well (Messi was more commonly making the run for a final ball by the likes of Xavi back then than he did later—and you even say that above, talking about how he produced more runs back then), though I’ve not done some deep film dive recently to validate that. Meanwhile, your reading of heat maps to dispute that is, as I’ve explained, failing to understand how to properly read and contextualize heat maps. If you have other more direct data on this precise question that isn’t heat map data, feel free to present it rather than playing silly games. I’m not sure the specifics of Messi’s 2009-2010 season really matters much in the grand scheme of things, but I’d certainly be happy to be alerted to data/information I wasn’t previously aware of.

One further thing I’ll note is that I didn’t say percent of a team’s passes is direct evidence about how deep a player played. I presented it as indirect evidence which supports the conclusion that Messi played deeper (note: this should’ve been clear from me talking about what we’d “expect to see” in the data if a player played deeper on a possession-based team). A player who plays deeper will almost always have a higher percent of his team’s passes. But, of course, it’s possible for a player to position deeper and still have a lower percent of their team’s passes. Maybe one player is just ghosting around deep and not being open to receive a pass, maybe one player is much more direct with their passing relative to the rest of their team than the other, maybe one player is dispossessed deep a lot more (which means they’re not making a pass when that happens, leading to lower passing numbers). There’s potential confounding factors, which is to be expected with indirect evidence. Indirect evidence is never going to be perfect. Of course, in this case, direct evidence can be found in actually watching the players. And we’ve all done that and so we already know you’re wrong. The premise of these arguments is basically humoring you by discussing your attempts to gaslight us with information that you are arguing disproves what our eyes showed us. In that context, I provided additional information that helps us contextualize the heat map info you rely on, such that we can see that the data as a whole is not at all inconsistent with Messi having played deeper (which is also what our eye test tells us), and in fact the data (including what you rely on) shows us exactly what we’d expect to see if Messi played deeper. Of course, the more important thing is that the eye test also tells us Messi played deeper, and so my argument is in no way reliant on indirect statistical evidence.

 

IMO, Messi is the most talented player to play the game since Diego Maradona.

Was he as gifted and talented in October 2022 as he was in January 2023. Yes, of course. Just because he won the World Cup it didn't mean that he went thru a magical metamorphosis and he gained a whole new power after that.

But because he won the WC, the naysayers no longer had "yeah, but he didn't win the World Cup" argument, And the WC should've shut them up. But again, here we are. He needed it, to shut some of you up.

So, he was as talented before winning the WC as he was afterwards, but the WC wins should've shut all the haters up (with a few exceptions, I guess).

And as far as, "but did he need the WC to truly be a GOAT? Can a player be as great without the WC as with it, thus why should his GOAT status be effective?" Perhaps this is a good point, after all, its one tournament. But here its where it gets tough for Messi to have had the GOAT status without the WC; One, the other two guys (Pele & Maradona) might've been as talented as Messi, BUT they were as talented plus won the WC. So Messi needed to tie Pele & Maradona. And Second, fair or not, Messi is from one of the coveted nations that is always one of the usual names that are favored to win the WC - thus, if you play for those "usual suspect" nations, you have to delivered. And we all know who the usual suspect nations are that are always the "nations that can legitimately win the WC" some of them drop out at time, but they always come back to the list, Brazil, Argentina, Germany, France, Spain, England and Italy. Its always these three nations that carry the burden of being one of the favorites. Maybe not fair to Messi, but b/c he is from one of these nations, then the WC is almost mandatory.

 

Okay, well I’d appreciate getting a more developed reply, since the issues in question are pretty dispositive to the discussion.

In any event, I think you must be fundamentally misunderstanding what a False 9 is (or trying to confuse people). You keep saying Messi was a False 9 as if that indicates that he played further forward than Ronaldo. But the whole point of the False 9 role is precisely that the player drops deep a lot! You’re basically saying “Messi didn’t drop deep much, because he was playing a role that is defined by dropping deep a lot.”

History of Messi’s Role

And, furthermore, just as some clarification, I should note that Messi didn’t play as a False 9 during his whole prime anyways. In fact, he didn’t play it for most of his prime. I think you are aware of this, but maybe not and either way there may be other readers that aren’t. The timeline basically went like this:

- Messi lined up on the wing prior to Guardiola.

- In Guardiola’s first season (2008-2009), Messi lined up on the wing the entire time (typically with Eto’o playing the CF role), except at the very end of the season they tried the False 9 role in the Clasico that Barcelona ended up winning 6-2. It was just that one match though.

- In the 2009-2010 season, they’d gotten Ibrahimovic, so they didn’t actually do the False 9 that often, but it did come out a few times to great effect (for instance, in the match he scored 4 goals against Arsenal).

- In the 2010-2011 season, Ibrahimovic had left, and Messi played primarily as a False 9. This remained the case in the 2011-2012, 2012-2013, and 2013-2014 seasons.

- Then, in 2014-2015, they got Suarez, and Messi was fairly quickly moved back to the wing. And Messi stayed lining up primarily on the wing in 2015-2016 and 2016-2017.

- In the 2017-2018 season, Barcelona changed tactics to a 4-4-2. In these tactics, Messi was not lined up on the wing, but he did not line up as a False 9 either. Suarez was lined up as a typical 9, and Messi played more of a Trequartista role behind Suarez. That involved occupying similar spaces as a False 9 but it’s obviously a different role in the overall scheme of the tactics.

- In 2018-2019 and 2019-2020, they moved back to a 4-4-3 and Messi was back on the wing, with Suarez still a typical Number 9.

- With Suarez gone in 2020-2021, there was a lot of tactical fluidity, and Messi sometimes played as a False 9, but also played on the wing in a 4-3-3, as a CAM in a 4-5-1, as an AM in a weird 3-4-2-1, and as a trequartista up top with Griezmann. Just a lot of different stuff being tried that season, so I wouldn’t say he had one specific role that season.

So, overall, in his career at Barcelona, Messi only really played a False 9 role in four seasons (2010-2011, 2011-2012, 2012-2013, and 2013-2014). He occasionally played it in 2009-2010 as well, and occasionally in other seasons when players were out and whatnot. But basically, it was mainly just those four seasons. He didn’t play it the other seasons, primarily because the team had world-class Number 9’s (Eto’o, Ibrahimovic, and Suarez). Messi played a False 9 role in seasons where the team didn’t have a world-class pure #9, and instead had guys that were better utilized (or at least similarly well utilized) as inside forwards.

Of course, this is all kind of beside the point in terms of discussing the depth at which Messi played, because these role changes didn’t really change how Messi himself played all that much. There were definitely changes on the margins, for sure (for instance, he was definitely on the wing a bit more in 2014-2015 than in the several prior years), but he basically always drifted around and could be found deep and in both wing and central areas. In my view, whether he was playing a False 9 role or not was less about what Messi was doing and more about what his teammates in front of him were doing—when he was a False 9, you had inside forwards who would make diagonal runs in front of him, and when he wasn’t a False 9 you had a pure striker who would make runs in front of him.

 

This is a bizarre take. Messi did not win to shut haters up. Messi won to make his country proud, bring happiness and personal glory. You compete in a WC out of duty and ego. And yes him winning matters, he showed that he had the grinta and showed his quality in the most important tournament in football.

 

Messi playing as a false 9 absolutely does translate to playing a higher position. I think you do not understand the role of a false 9 as commonly interpreted or as Messi interpreted the role:

https://www.coachesvoice.com/cv/what-is-a-false-nine-explained-messi-kane-firmino-fabregas/

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/v8zzYEhpsXQ
Xabi Alonso detailing Messi's role and positioning in those years.

I would add the following nuaces in Messi's case:

1. When he was younger, he could be devastating when on the run. Dropping away from the centerbacks offered him the space to gather speed and runs that are hard to stop.
2. Passing quality that helped provide fluidity to Barcelona's play and final ball ability
3. Diminutive stature and not able to occupy CBs directly, play back to goal, or heading ability in the box - preventing him from occupying traditional positions.

Irrespective of all that, it is literally undeniable that Messi played closer to goal than Ronaldo. Undeniable.

This should give you an idea of the sheer volume of chances as the most forward man making runs behind mid-blocks, etc. You would be hard pressed to get this sort of volume of missed chances from Ronaldo - in fact, you'd be incapable.

 

So Messi is better at off the ball movement because Ronaldo is incapable of finding himself in so many chances as Messi did in this video?

 

This is bizarre because the only "hater" here claiming that "you need to win the world cup to be truly considered a GOAT" here is you Man. Me, a Ronaldo fan said Messi already were one of the GOATs before 2022. So you're basically saying that Messi shutted your mouth up.

In any case, I already explained that you yourself said before the 2022 final that Messi was already the GOAT. So I was right @lessthanjake and Loco don't really think that "you need to win the world cup to truly be considered a GOAT". He only said that to get Ronaldo out of the conversation.

 

The World Cup was the cherry on the cake for Pele and now Messi

I know Pelé used to love to remind people about his 3 World Cup trophies
He would talk about it so much that he almost lead people into believing that was his entire legacy
It was not and it wasn’t even close to being so

For maradona the World Cup was the entire cake
Without it the legacy collapses like a house of cards

Leading Napoli to Serie A titles in an open era where Verona and sampdoria also won Serie A titles isn’t nearly as meaningful without a World Cup

And within the context of 1980s Serie A I have my own reservations about how meaningful Napoli winning a Serie A title was even to begin with

Historic it was(for Napoli) having never previously won a league title in their history prior to 1987
They won it again in 1990 with maradona

And never again until 2023

Verona won a Serie A title in 1985
Never before and never after
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hellas_Verona_FC

Sampdoria won a league title in 1991
Never before and never after
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/UC_Sampdoria#:~:text=Sampdoria have won the Scudetto,Cup Winners' Cup in 1990.






You can throw all of di stefanos league titles in the bin and you can do the same with Johan cruyff and you can do the same with cristiano and you can do the same with Puskás
They don’t need it and they are not reliant on it

Their exploits in the European Cup/CL alone surpass anything maradona did at club level

How did the 1986 world cup propel maradona to the same level as Pele
How did it even take him above platini

The most you can say is it possibly put him on the same level as the french man

There should be question marks on Anyone who plays 15+ years of professional football and is reliant on one single 4 week event
Not matter how great that single event was

 

All the haters still out here trying to make the same tire argument they made before he won the WC and now. Give it a rest. He has won more trophies than any other player ever, 8 Balon d'Or, only player ever to win Olympic Gold Medal, Youth WC, Copa America and WC - but some of you are still crying in your piss. While the rest of the world has been able to enjoy one of the greatest sports career ever. And we got to see and cheer for a wonderful person, who is loved by all that are around him, and we got to see him win it all. He won it all. That's the mic drop.

 

No, I don’t misunderstand the role. You’re just trying to twist Messi playing a role that’s defined by typically dropping deep into somehow saying Messi didn’t drop deep. It’s a farce, and bears no relationship to what everyone saw with their eyes. It’s also not relevant to most of Messi’s career, since he only played that role for a few years. And this argument by you is fairly ironic because he only really played that role in earlier years with Xavi and yet you’ve spent quite a while arguing that Messi dropped deep more in those years, not less. So there’s no consistency here from you at all. Just a scattershot of wrong arguments, with no regard to internal consistency. The reality is that the False 9 role is defined by dropping deep, Messi dropped deep a lot when he played that role (though when Messi played that role he was also positioned on the shoulder of the last defender a bit more than he was later—a difference of degree, but he always played deep a lot). There is zero valid argument that Messi playing as a False 9 somehow means he wasn’t dropping deep much—just a completely stupid argument that you can’t possibly actually believe.

Also, you frequently use the term “occupy CBs,” in a way that makes no sense and/or is just completely redundant with talking about headers and back to goal. Messi is well capable of “occupying CBs,” as he is very well capable of making runs past CBs onto throughballs. We’ve seen it many many times. He isn’t someone you want to target for headers, but Messi is well capable of playing the striker role in a similar manner to someone like Aguero. He dropped deep instead because he provided even more value that way, due to his GOAT-level dribbling, GOAT-level final ball, and GOAT-level shooting from just inside or just outside the box. That ridiculous skill set would get largely wasted if he played as a pure striker, so no one would ever have him do that. You don’t have someone like Messi play a relatively limited role because that’s just not what you do with a GOAT-level player—though, in contrast, it is actually what teams eventually did with Ronaldo.

LOL, undeniable except by anyone with eyes.

What is the point here? Are you under the impression that Cristiano Ronaldo hasn’t missed a ton of shots? We know for a fact that Messi outdoes xG more than Ronaldo and that Ronaldo took more shots, including more shots in the box. So, when it comes to missing chances, we know Ronaldo did it more.

______

Anyways, I just want to point out again that you are simultaneously arguing that Ronaldo played deeper than Messi and that, instead of providing midfield overloads like Messi, Ronaldo was getting more off-ball value by sticking on the defensive line and making runs and pushing the defensive line back. Just completely inconsistent stuff—another example of scattershot arguments with no regard for internal consistency. And, after I pointed this out a ton of times, to the extent that you addressed this inconsistency, it was to just say Ronaldo played on the wing. Which is not a question of depth (which renders this whole argument about who played deeper stupid, since you’re basically conceding you’re wrong). Nor is it a position from which you’ll be very involved in midfield build-up. It’s also not even a more difficult place for a speedy player to score goals or get assists from, as that inside forward role is an extremely prolific scoring/assisting role in modern football (and that’s in part why Messi also drifts into those areas a fair bit). And it’s an especially prolific role when you’ve got guys like Benzema and Rooney that drop back to link up play and make room for the inside forward’s runs. It’s also not even consistently true that Ronaldo always played on the wing, as Ronaldo lined up as a CF a decent bit, even in earlier years (and a ton in later years, which are years that for these purposes you just choose to pretend didn’t happen, while simultaneously talking up the goalscoring and team success he had in those years).

 

And Messi still won more than Ronaldo ever will. The race is over, mate

 

@SayWhatIWant
You have to clearly state what you are arguing and reconcile different arguments.

Atm you are jumping from a topic to topic saying things that are inconsistent with each other and often literally opposite of each other.

 

There's no point in being reductive. Something happened to Messi around 2013 - his injury and maybe a bit more. But he never recovered the same "zest". He was far more energetic before, and had better conditioning. So he was not producing trailing runs, or defensive-line testing runs at the same volume. He adapted by improving his consistency with that outside-the-box shot he really likes and he improved his passing register and decision-making. Became a smarter player.
What you seem to fail to understand is you cannot compare a left forward to a center forward. They do not play the same game, field the same responsibilities, or find themselves in the same game situations. Ronaldo plays much farther from the net during the years Messi was a false 9. Much farther. His ball receptions are at a significant distance from the net and zone 14. I don't know how this is a point of contention. It is basic positional understanding.

 

There is nothing inconsistent in what I said.
And for that matter, I am still waiting for @lessthanjake to tell us
if based on his pass % of the team's passes approach,
If in 2009-10 Messi had less touches/passes in deep zones than later.

 

LOL no you’re not: https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/c...h-better-thread.2011827/page-25#post-41747575. And yes, you very clearly are being inconsistent, and you legitimately have no real response after it’s been pointed out in a load of posts by multiple posters. Even in the above, you’re just blatantly deflecting. You have no response. That should end the discussion, since it’s so obvious you’re just throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks, without any regard for truth or consistency.