Yeah I'm not sure there was any stark difference between his dribbling from pre 2014 to afterwards.
Agree. Always spoke about him with respect, even to Morgan. Also at Euro 2016 if I am not wrong Ferguson was there and both Ronaldo or Nani treated him with respect.
He was a kick and run merchant which really shows now that he can't use his crazy acceleration and pace anymore.
All those clips show is speed. Look at how someone who didn't have amazing speed dribbled to someone that did. He couldn't even beat Cremonese and Lecce defenders 1v1 that's how reliant he was on pace when dribbling.
Speed and dribbling. I saw him playing live for Sporting and Portugal Youth NT's. Sure he did it using speed, but he had nothing to do with the player from 2015/16 who even showed some loss of agility and loss of good relation with the ball more turned into a finisher.
He used to showboat a lot as a youngster and used all sorts of skills but as older as he got the less he used those skills because he realized he could simply outpace defenders.
I'm stoked to see how Rashford and Martial do in the next few weeks without him. We've kept bringing players in to "'help them grow" or to add goals up front. I think we should see where it takes us until the summer
Yeah by 2017, he was completing a shockingly low 40 dribbles in a season. He just didn't have that in his repertoire anymore.
Not really. His dribbling was largely predicated on great agility/turning speed, balance and leg speed/reactions. His pace and acceleration didn't go away in his 30s, the rest did and he stopped being dangerous as a dribbler. The last season Cristiano was even remotely a dribbler was 13/14
......
Keano and Rio need to advise them all based on their superior understanding of football and conversational man-management, as all these CL clubs are clearly just as clueless as EtH
SCP? Harsh, he might stink the place up every now and then but we don't play any better without him. Besides, we're only the world famous Redcafe because of him popularising us.
Truly mad innit, wouldn't have ever in a million years predicted this end for him back at the start of the year...
That's true, the thing that Ronaldo lost relatively early is agility and also his first touch went from spotless to a bit more "normal". But he compensated with great movement and far better positioning than your average top player.
As an athlete he deserves so much credit for how he reinvented himself as an off ball box monster once his on ball abilities went away, mantaining a still very high level of impact
He really does. It's genuinely amazing because he had to work very hard on it during what is generally players' prime. It's the kind of topic that should be talked about during his interviews, how and why he decided to change that much, what was the process.
As a person and ambassador for football he deserves so much stick for how he's conducted himself lately. Absolute horrorshow!
It’s not talked about enough, a chronic knee injury causes him to completely change his style of play and yet he maintains his incredible G/A output.
The only thing Cristiano Ronaldo likes is Cristiano Ronaldo.
Spot on.
By his standards, it was. But it's been bettered several times. His output in 2014 was 65 goal contributions. And had 14 MOTM awards.
That's not the correct description for young Ronaldo. More like description on Bale.
Yeah declined visibly over the 9 weeks after he ran through Fulham and scored a last minute goal for a win.
He binned himself
Real life Dark KnightHe binned himself
For me it is exactly that.
I think for many it was always more about the story than about the football. Cristiano had this Rocky Balboa narrative that many loved. Messi's career was too straight forward for a long time and now gained a nice little climax at the end. I read an article a while ago that compared the Argentinian worship of Maradona to the Brazilian worship of Pelé which is less emotional and intense. The article blamed it on Pelé having basically no rough edges, being so professional and ideal that few could relate with him while Maradona was a man of the people with lots of flaws. People can relate with the latter far more. Messi in that sense with his quiet personality, linear career and discreet private life was more like Pelé and while Cristiano is pretty much the antithesis of Maradona in many points, he had this American dream narrative going for him as the "less talented" individual. I think what changed the minds of many people now is actually not that Messi proved to be the superior footballer but that he now has a relatable narrative going for him as well with his failures with Argentina, going through hard times and overcoming the obstacles to succeed at the very end.
Very true. It is also the reason that Tiger Woods became more beloved after his affairs and injury problems than when he was just winning everything with a seemingly flawless family life.
Aesthetic matters, but let's not fool ourselves...aesthetics should be combined with efficiency or consistency(like Messi), which is why Ronaldinho or R9 aren't considered GOATs.
He actually did talk about that in an interview but it was so much bs. Claimed he hadn't lost ability but rather made a conscious decision to focus entirely on goals to the exclusion of the rest because those were the most important thing. Which is true enough, but also, he scored more goals back when he was still an on ball wizard as well, so yeah
As a person, I believe Kathryn Mayorga
Eh, age more than the chronic knee issue
