To be fair Ronaldo did play in that game against France, it wasn't the whole match but his injury did help to cut the pressure France was applying to Portugal. France was stepping all over Portugal as soon as the game started and it looked like a matter of time for them to score, then when Ronaldo tried to slow down the game he got injured and by stopping the game France lost their momentum. It wasn't intentional but I think hadn't he played (and getting injured) France would have scored a goal or two within the first half hour and it would had been almost impossible for Portugal to comeback, also after the injury the team got more motivated and started to play better and make the game to be a lot more even.
8 min Payet puts in a strong challenge on Ronaldo near the halfway line, taking man and ball. Ronaldo looks in quite a lot of pain and is being treated, and booed.
10 min That’s a fine save from Rui Patricio! Pepe slipped over and gave the ball to Payet on the left wing. He played a delicious angled pass over the defence to find Griezmann, who improvised a first-time lobbed header from just inside the box. It was a brilliant effort, and would have looped in but for a crucial leaping save from Rui Patricio. From the resulting corner he made a more comfortable save from Giroud’s header.
12 min Portugal are being battered at the moment. They just need to keep this at 0-0 for as long as possible, 120 minutes ideally.
15 min France are harassing and bullying Portugal in possession, and it’s almost painfully one-sided at the moment.
20 min Portugal are playing with 10 men for now, and having their best spell of possession in the match.
22 min The stop-start nature of Ronaldo injury unwittingly stalled France’s momentum, but they are back on top now. Sissoko goes on a storming run through the centre of the pitch before hitting a fierce left-footed shot that is deflected just over the bar.
It never crossed your mind that in the 17 minutes Portugal played with 10 men he did more harm than good?. And that the team played better when he left because they were 11vs11 again, and not some Anime comeback thing?
Aside from the 2014 WC qualifiers, Argentina has always struggled to qualify for a WC with or without Messi in the past. Even in recent memory, Argentina lost 3-0 to Brazil in the qualifiers. I'm not saying Messi sucks for Argentina or he doesn't contribute, but he definitely isn't a difference maker and certainly doesn't elevate any of the players around him. I mean in a squad with world class talent like Aguero, Higuain, Di Maria, and Messi for them not to gel at all is crazy considering they've played for almost a decade in the Olympic squad that won in 2008. I'm not trying to take sides here because Messi and Ronaldo are my two favorite players and it's been a pleasure growing up watching them both, but I've watched Argentina play long enough to know that Messi is not much of a difference maker on the team and certainly didn't lead them to the WC final in 2014 he merely performed better than most of the attacking players, but the real heroes of the team were the defense and Mascherano who played his ass off that tournament.
Because they had joke managers for a decade, remember Maradona? And the midfield isn't too hot either, look at what they were fielding in 2014WC.
There's plenty of squads oozing with talent like Argentina that end up doing nothing, 2006 England had Rio, Rooney, Lampard, Becks, Terry, Carrick, Ashley and Joe Cole, never went to a final. Same could be said of Portugal pre-2004 with Paulo Sousa, Figo, Rui Costa, Conceiçao, Pauleta or Nuno Gomes or Spain in 2002 with Casillas, Puyol, Hierro, Raul, Tristan, Valeron, Xavi and Joaquin among others.
All those players together didn't matter in a lot of international competitions for years, there's only one thing we know about Argentina, when Messi plays they reach 3 international finals in a row, when he doesn't they fail to qualify for the World Cup