honestly .. C. Ronaldo winning on Messi in the next World Cup 2026 .. ! I want to see where the younger muleteer Feijão Tropeiro is going to put his face. this happening !
I want you to realize one thing... Most if not all of players playing in superclubs from 2005 till now are little overrated if compared to players of the past, Cristiano Ronaldo isn't the exception, he is in the T5-T10 tier imho not just due to his credential and level, but because he always played in superteams, even ********in Juventus was dominant before arrived, United was a elo rated top team in Europe back mid-2003 and Madrid was among the top team before him and top invested in Europe for two more summers after he - and his ballon d'ors friends Kaka and Benzema plus world class Xabi Alonso - arrived. Cristiano Ronaldo's performances in Euro's and World Cup's with Portugal aren't anywhere close to his performances in clubs, not close to Eusebio in 1966. What if the difference between Cristiano and Eusebio is only about the power of their clubs in their respective times? You all know that rich clubs are much richer since 2005 and with all pull and analytics is much easier to spot the right and top players thus more difference and dominance. Cristiano Ronaldo is a inferior footballer to Messi simply as that, more flawed on the ball, with inferior vision of the game while on the ball, harder for the eyes, less participative with the ball on his feet thus more peripheral in the game, less goal participative etc. no title in the world would turn that.
There's a lot wrong here but your ignorance of Benfica in the 1960s, with respect to your point on Eusebio, brings everything you bring into question. Benfica was a super-team for all intents and purposes in the 1960s as they were structurally allowed to dominate because Antonio Salazar refused to let Benfica's players leave Portugal. That Benfica team reached 5 European Cup finals that decade (5 in 8 years) - only AC Milan and Real Madrid have done better. Eusebio even joined the team while they were European Champions, something Manchester United and Real Madrid were not close to being when CR7 joined. Real Madrid and Manchester United won the CL with Ronaldo because of Ronaldo - there was no indication before he joined that they were going to win it any time soon. Real Madrid went years losing in the Round of 16 before Ronaldo joined.
📊 Les joueurs avec le meilleur ratio de passes décisives par match en Liga au 21eme siècle pic.twitter.com/u9qel4MAj1— PopFoot (@ThePopFoot) April 12, 2026
🇦🇷Messi vs 🇵🇹C.RonaldoWhile they played in Spain, 2009/10 to 2017/18 pic.twitter.com/yHpK1pABNr— ... (@Trachta10) April 26, 2026 Lionel Messi 2009 - 2018 472 goals 177 Opta assists 80 Opta pre assists 1187 team goals 40207 minutes played Cristiano 2009 - 2018 450 goals 120 Opta assists 61 Opta pre assists 1128 team goals 37825 minutes played Lionel Messi 1.63 goals + Opta assists/pre assists per 90 61.4% involvement Cristiano Ronaldo 1.50 goals + Opta assists/pre assists per 90 55.9 % involvement ———————————- New method Goal = 1 point Opta assist = 0.50 points Opta pre assist = 0.25 points Lionel Messi 472 goals = 472 177 assists × 0.50 = 88.5 80 pre assists × 0.25 = 20 Total score: 472 + 88.5 + 20 = 580.5 Weighted attacking contribution per 90 580.5 ÷ 40207 × 90 = 1.30 Weighted contribution as a share of team goals 580.5 ÷ 1187 = 48.9% Cristiano Ronaldo 450 goals = 450 120 assists × 0.50 = 60 61 pre assists × 0.25 = 15.25 Total score 450 + 60 + 15.25 = 525.25 Weighted attacking contribution per 90 525.25 ÷ 37825 × 90 = 1.25 Weighted contribution as a share of team goals 525.25 ÷ 1128 = 46.6%
Raw involvement overstates creative contributions because it gives the same value to goals, assists and pre assists. A weighted model is more balanced because it recognises that a goal is the decisive final action, an intentional assist is one step removed and an intentional pre assist is another step further removed.
Goalscoring has always been, on average, more valuable and representative of an attacking player prowess and impact than assist-delivering. Proof is that nearly all the greatest ever, even those that were not true full-blooded strikers actually, are much more outstanding in their scoring stats than in those regarding assists.
Of the top 25 from here mate, I think that wouldn't be true for Cruyff, Matthews (opposite will be true for him), Dalglish or Cantona, quite probably not for Garrincha I assume (even though he had his most famous moment while being a key scorer for Brazil in 1962 that's true) and possibly (it's uncertain as far as I know even if AI was telling me about quite a few derived assists from his prime lately - with 2nd hand info but not what I could rely on I guess though) not for Best, while I don't know overall for Hagi, and for non-penalty goals at least (or open play) it'd be borderline rather than clear for Baggio I guess wouldn't it? Also Beckenbauer was primarily an initiator rather than scorer, in terms of his attacking role/play (and Bobby Moore was a great passer, and had famous assists in the World Cup Final too). England Player Honours - World Soccer Players of the Century Meanwhile, though they scored loads, we know retrospectively that Pele and Puskas were huge assisters relative to other players of their time too still, Di Stefano was renowned for all-round play, and Maradona in his most famous time at least (as opposed to in Argentina as young player) wasn't more of a scorer than creator (or for open play goals not a substantially bigger scorer than assister). I wouldn't be surprised if Bobby Charlton had more assists+pre-assists than goals even too (again AI was alluding to good numbers when including pre-assists for the late 60s kind of period.....but it's something not explored yet by Trachta I think so uncertain at the moment). Platini was renowned as an all-time passer, even though his goalscoring numbers stand out of course, that's true. Zico was a great creative player as you are well aware I know. Batistuta, Muller, Ronaldo and Eusebio probably fit what you're saying the clearest, but they aren't right at the top.
Using this one as a more traditionalist (and not British-centric) source: IFFHS' Century Elections Schiaffino, Didi, Rivera, Fritz Walter all in top 25 (predominantly renowned for creative side I'd think, albeit scorers to a decent extent also - in Walter's case like with Maradona more a scorer as young player I suppose). In the Europe voting, above the cut-off (for being a candidate for world vote)/dotted line: Kopa, Gullit, Michael Laudrup, Sandro Mazzola, Gento, Masopost could all be there more thanks to assisting/pre-assisting/creating than scoring I'd think). In the South America voting it might seem likewise for Zizinho and Pedernera for example too Checking comme's Twitter feed enables to me to see things like this (via a comparison between Moreno and Pele posted by the same guy posting this, that comme had re-tweeted): Guido on X: "Schiaffino, según Juan López (DT de la selección uruguaya campeona del '50), tenía la misma caracteristica de Moreno o Pedernera de hacer jugar bien a cualquiera que le pusieran al lado." / X "Schiaffino, according to Juan López (DT of the Uruguayan national team champion of '50), had the same characteristic as Moreno or Pedernera of making anyone who was placed alongside him play well." Anyway, just putting the "other side of the argument" Frank - not looking to fall out with you or anything (and like I say re: your favoured Zico I think a big emphasis on creating helps his argument overall probably, even though for sure he did have better end product stats in the scoring department, especially compared to just OPTA assists - but often his best or most stand-out game is cited as the one vs Liverpool with multiple quality/key assists and directing the game as attacking midfielder with skill and vision). Interestingly the top-rated Serie A player (I tend to think I wouldn't concur but it should be kept in mind that the Z-score might not totally account for the fact that Serie A used to be the top league and now it's not) based on DBS Calcio's new Z-scores would be Gonzalo Higuain for an individual season, and I guess that was a season he scored more than assisted by quite a bit, but vice versa for English top league (though the seasons on there are more limited) it'd be Kevin De Bruyne (close for Serie A the likes of sweeper Ruud Krol, Maradona (84/85). Roberto Mancini (90/91) and also Nils Liedholm probably more for creative play back in the 1950s; close ones for English league being Suarez 13/14, Fabregas 09/10 - to be fair a season he was scoring plenty....with Glenn Hoddle the highest of the 80s ones so far for 83/84 (more for creating/assisting I think). I had a look yesterday but might be forgetting some close to the top for Premier League/Serie A (but Higuain and De Bruyne having the top single season averages is corrrect I think anyway)....
Yes, naturally goals scored is more representative of attacking contributions. Goals are more frequent than assists which are more frequent than pre-assists. The game of football is already balancing them out based on frequency of occurance, therefore importance, which is why additional layer of artificially assigning weight to each is baseless. It "balances" out comparison between Messi and Ronaldo, but only under the assumption that their gc% should be closer. It is baseless. If you apply the same method to likes of Haaland and De Bruyne, it doesnt result in "balance", but much more extreme take on who contributes to scoring more. Haaland would dominate De Bryune with this method, because Haaland is much more goal-oriented than KDB, while in reality, we know this is the wrong direction in that specific comparison. Goalscorers are already naturally "benefiting" from the fact that goals scored is a metric that gets registered much more often than the others. So there is no reason to tinker with natural dynamics of the game.
Gerd Muller and Eusebio given so many many Assists ..also Gerd Muller was the best provider assister at the Bundesliga in 1970-1971 and 1971-1972 shared with Uli Hoeness seasons Eusebio 's Prime 1961-1968 seasons had moments like brazilian wing-back Nelinho or Total Footballer Rainer Bonhof from being a greater Set-Pieces taker ..& Vision Crossing , Plays one-twos and LOng Range Balls Eusebio only was bad in Passes and Vision to try Killer Balls always Bergkamp and Zico were better on this aspect of the game than Eusebio for example "! but Eusebio was a Good Assister yes in general . "!
Yeah, I know that Muller had some periods when he had many assists (and during 70s seemed to become a better team player with good awareness and linking), and Eusebio could create chances evidently using his speed and skill (but also at times good passes - one game he played well in as a provider/midfielder IIRC btw was the one playing for the Europe XI in 1973, albeit late in his career and in a friendly even if a significant and high level one): But I think that in terms of the overall stats (though for Eusebio especially we might still not have the full idea) it would seem like they will have had substantially more goals than assists I think wouldn't it (both of them being prolific scorers of course)?
I would say that (Brazilian) Ronaldo and Eusebio perhaps seem quite similar in their assisting/linking capabilities, comparing pre-injury Ronaldo. But both of them scored much more than assisted I guess. Ronaldo could play somewhat of a playmaking role when alongside a Romario (or a Batistuta as in another 'Europe vs' game - in 1997 in the Rest of World XI); also at Inter Milan (but not with a big amount of OPTA assists over the season), while he had a few assists for Barcelona too using skills/speed before cutting the ball back to a team-mate, and assisted Rivaldo in big WC games for example. But yeah Zico and Bergkamp were able to play truly like a mix of Odegaard/Albertini in their passing game (Zico, and Bergkamp at Ajax where he was less playmaker anyway - maybe same can be said re: Zico at Udinese due to role?) could still be prolific but were less solo-show kind of goalscorers compared to Eusebio and Ronaldo (not to say Coluna/Simoes/Jose Augusto or De La Pena/Guardiola/Figo didn't help their scoring with their creative play too for example though). Comparing pre-injury Ronaldo to Eusebio it seems to be that Eusebio was a bit more explosive/decisive in shooting and Ronaldo a bit mote elaborate and skilled with the ball I'd say though.
The primary objective of a football match is to score goals, victory is determined solely by the goal count. In any system, the action that directly fulfills the primary objective holds higher intrinsic value than the actions supporting it. Scoring is a scarcer skill set than assisting under high pressure. Therefore, the scorer is logically more valuable than the assister.
We are discussing goal contribution of attacking player, so it would be not surprising nor weird if Haaland ended up ouscoring KDB in this comparison, but of course this would not imply Haaland is entitled of a bigger share of merit in the wins of his team than KDB's. Indeed, historically, most of those that general consensus places in the highest positions of all-time ranking (in the attacking players sub-category) produced more jaw dropping numbers in the goal-scoring column than in those for assists. This is observed everywhere and across ages, by their very nature, assists always tended to be much more equally distributed in teams, in the most outstanding ones in the sport history as well as in those that were quickly forgotten, while goal-scoring statistics much more often worked as litmus test for revealing true greatness (again, of course as far as attacking players are concerned). That is why I back those that claimed goals carry more value than assists (on average) and must be weighted more in an attempt to compare goal contributions of players
Do you have a reply for my post mate, where I was breaking it down player by player (in general terms without posting full assist tallies for each, but you could say if and where you perceive I got anything wrong), among those voted in top 25 of World Soccer Player of Century voting and IFFHS Player of Century voting? Remembering that like Sexy Beast said not every goal has an assist so the tally (among all team-mates) for goals scored always exceeds that for assists made (unless including pre-assists and assists together vs goals alone). Also remembering that players playing closer to the goal normally (not always) score the most (and even score/assist the most). What we would probably agree on is that it will vary (between whether the assist or goalscoring shot/move was more impressive and/or important - what we can say though is that without the scorer scoring the assist isn't an assist but often without the pass, or sequence of passes, or skill or dribble, the chance to score wouldn't arise in the first place either - it's not a one-way street where every goal is fully credited irrespective of how great or unlikely an assist would be, but every assist has an asterisk because it took a good finish to convert it is it?). If we keep an eye on DBS Calcio it seems like Euro 84 grades are being added, so we might be able to see how highly Tigana was rated (with several key assists - I know that's not all his role entailed) in comparison to Platini (playing more a scorer's role than normal) and see that it is closer than might be expected on the stats. De Bruyne had his record-tying 20 Premier League assists when he registered his highest PL/1st Division Z-score I mentioned before in 2019/20, while for World Cups although Schillaci is up there for Z-scores so far for his goals-filled 1990 World Cup, so is Maradona (several assists as well as the famous goals in 1986) and so is Cruyff (playmaking masterclass with key assists, while not being the stand-out scorer alone for Netherlands, in 1974). Even isolating 'attacking contributions' or even 'scoring contributions' the ratings and verdicts put them as the top players, but the scoring stats alone don't do that if you see what I mean?
If there were to be any weighting system I guess it should be based on equivalent of 'increase in xG value' after assisting (and pre-assisting) actions and 'goals compared to xG' for scorers (xG upon receiving ball, not when taking shot though). But that's impossible for most of football history, so it's probably best that Trachta's calculations just reflect a factual goal contribution % (with whichever method is being presented and clearly labelled - goals+OPTA assists, goals plus assists/pre-assists, non-penalty goals+non-penalty assists etc....) isn't it?
I didn't try to find the pre-shot xG stats etc, but from this weekend's Premier League games for example.... I think for this goal most of the impetus (xG creation) could be credited to Odegaard, even if Trossard still needed to score: PERFECT ODEGAARD PASS & TROSSARD GOAL! For Forest-Newcastle goals I think that sharing the credit for both goals between assister and scorer would be realistic (even a bit more to assist on the Newcastle goal arguably; probably vice versa for Forest goal considering it was a one-two also, but return pass shouldn't be underestimated I think): Forest strike LATE to earn huge point! | Nottingham Forest 1-1 Newcastle | Premier League Highlights - YouTube
I sort of dislike this method. If a forward moves to an advantageous strike position, with intelligent movement without the ball, to maximize his chance of scoring prior to receiving the ball, he actually penalizes himself for setting himself up for a low differential value chance (because his xG value will be closer to 1, the better job he does prior to receiving the ball) with effort that goes entirely unnoticed. In fact, the better he loses his marker, the better he times his runs, the more distance he sets hismelf apart from the nearest defender due to his athleticism, the lower his chance of receiving credit for value added after receiving the ball. In fact, he should do the opposite and make sure whatever positive actions he does, he does after he receives the ball, never before. To maximize the value added to an attacking sequence with the ball, what he should do is just try as many marauding runs as possible, by ruining tactical shapes and demanding the ball from deeper positions, compromising potential passing angles. Make the sequence entirely dependent on his on-the-ball threat, and never about anything else. Any successful solo-attempts will pay dividends, because he is maximizing for opportunities for individual credit, instead of doing what is pragmatically effective for the team. Rio Ferdinand mentions the level of relative comfort he felt as a defender, versus players who sort of limit themselves within this frame, no matter how godlike he was at that limited capacity, when he compares Thierry Henry and Nicolas Anelka. https://m.youtube.com/shorts/6DEMwfqE5G8 The discussion sort of applies to Jack Grealish also. The best way to maximize overall team goal count or success, will rarely be the best way to maximize threat added with the ball within attacking sequences for an individual. It essentially turns football into a game of who can manage to play in the most self-aggrandizing manner, holding the team results as a hostage. Can't hold Manchester City hostage? Try doing it some place else. It is why for a player like Jack Grealish, who can be rated marvelously in terms of sequence involvements given the right context, struggles to find form on a team that holds him tactically accountable. Of course, the counter-argument might be that only special players can hold teams hostage with such idiosyncratic playstyles, to which I will respond that being special does not always mean the most effective or good. I'm sick to death about ineffective players being lamented over, because the team refuses to cater to their dream-case scenario, as if other players are afforded that hypothetical luxury also. Value added whilst in possession of the ball, during an attacking sequence, for me, can never be the way to measure the pragmatic effectiveness of a lot of attacking players. It is more of a measurement of proficiency at a certain manner of playstyle for me. The thing with goal counts is that nobody here pretends goal counts accurately reflects the value Kevin De Bruyne adds to his teams. It is what it is. Coverage of attacking sequence involvements, whether it is expected threat added, xGChain, or tallying of goals, assists, and pre-assists with any manner of ratios, is indeed another good data-set, but the way in which it is represented sometimes, really rubs me off the wrong way.
Whay you have claimed in previous messages is sensible and well informed, just let me stress that we are talking about goal contribution, not win contribution! For obvious reasons, players most involved in goalscoring are the fan favourites, so we see "goal contribution" comparisons, which consider the tail end of plays only (of course, with some arbitrary assumptions on the number of passes preceding the actual act of scoring to be consit). And in this very respect, I stick to my initial stance.
Comparing the DBS Calcio ratings (using new Z-score method - it just accounts for variance/source methodology in terms of how high and low they tend to go, but doesn't change order of players as such anyway) of Premier League 1995/96 players (first season currently showing DBS Calcio ratings where the full data for assists and goals can be found): Top 6 rated midfielders/forwards (considering Gullit played a lot as midfielder, even if he did start the season as sweeper indeed) Sasa Curcic (Bolton) - 4 goals, 7 assists - 6.59 Alan Shearer (Blackburn) - 31 goals, 7 assists Ok mate. I should say as well that I understand your premise (and remember you mentioned previously also) that sometimes/often an assist can be arbitrary or not significantly contributory (a simple pass to a player who shoots/dribbles a low xG situation into a goal, or the final pass played after some more significant or better ones). But I just wanted to say (I don't think you would/can disagree on this part) that it can happen the other way too (even somewhat crediting movement of scorer for tap-ins), as well as emphasising the overall assists number is lower for each team, and pointing out it's not clear cut in terms of highest rated players (all-time and/or in a particular competition) being more likely significant scorers than significant assisters and/or creators/initiators. I think even when assists were les of a thing (though maybe they were specifically looked at and tallied a bit earlier in Italian/French/Spanish football history than English it seems), fans and 'experts' still revered the players creating goals and chances quite a lot.
It's true that I wrote that post a bit hastily and forget to give any mention to off ball movement. It seems like I might rate a Gary Lineker for example relatively high at this point, so this aspect (as well as purely speed which for sure can be a significant football attribute if it can be converted to effectiveness) would play a part in that obviously and therefore it's not something I'm ignoring in general. I suppose I was just trying to say that in reality if a weighting system should be applied it should be one that considers what actually happened in each situation leading to a goal (and in theory xG could be used to help, even if saying xG is factual might seem a stretch as it's a calculation and maybe one that can be unrealistically applied in some situations if not considering enough factors beyond positional ones? - eg how good/comfortable a player is shooting on his right compared to his left side generally?) It's probably true that we get triggered by different things though: me when creators get under-acknowledged and you when others get totally overlooked and only the assister takes credit/plaudits....