What about the friendlies last year before they were world champions against Estonia B team, Jamaica, UAE and teams like that? And leaving Messi on for 90 minutes?
I don’t think anyone said that pal…
Just checked and in the six friendlies Argentina have played since last June, Messi has scored 13 goals (out of 25 goals in total for Argentina, none conceded). Not a bad return!
Possibly should look into though.... it's worked a charm for Argentina, 3 trophies, however you want to swing it, on the bounce, and the competition bookending the World Cup has been extra atrocious, maybe the belief is a winning camp statpadding is a happy camp.
Exactly this
Exact same cannot be said for Messi, the guy just finished the WC as the best player in an iconic fashion just a couple of months ago unlike Ronaldo who was a huge failure. How can you compare current Messi with Ronaldo? Argentine fans would kill to watch him live, not the case for Ronaldo, probably many Portuguese are not happy with his selection considering their reactions during the WC.
I don't criticise him for scoring against whoever, all the main European guys do it. I"ve discussed it in other threads with Kane and Lukaku. The problem is people talking about 'friendlies' as if scoring a hattrick in a friendly v Brazil is somehow less impressive than scoring goals against Lichtenstein in a 'competitive' match. There's only 10 countries in SA, they don't have endless qualifying matches against minnows. So the minnow games are going to come in friendlies.
If Argentina played Brazil in a friendly no one would be talking about statpadding though (11 years since Messi scored a hat trick against Brazil in a friendly now)
At the same age as Messi Ronaldo was the best scorer of the Euro. Like I have been saying, people are judging Messi and Ronaldo by the last years of their careers, this is absurd and just shows how on par they are in their incredible quality.
Why play minnows at all? Europe set up the Nations League to avoid it. Besides, half the teams in SA are terrible anyway.
Nonsense
Not sure why you tagged me on this one, but Argentina has played Brazil 10 times in friendlies since Messi came through for the NT. No one is calling him out for statpadding in those matches.
The stat padding has only started recently
Apart from Brazil and Argentina, where are the decent sides?
The level of competition the South American teams meet in their WC quals are tougher than Euro Quals:
The european weak nations are sunk in the ranking more because they rarely play nations they can have a chance to win, they don't play each other (except in the nations league that is a very recent competition).
If you were talking about the CONCACAF (Carabia, Central America and North America) which is filled with micro states I could maybe agree, but not with South America.
The rankings are hugely distorted considering the opponents. If it was a huge league where everyone played everyone, the rankings would change massively.
And even that was not enough for him to have a spot in the tournament's official best 11 let alone the best player of the Euros, tells you all you need to know about his impact. Ronaldo could not win any best player award in any NT tournament at the beginning-mid or late career, no ifs or buts.. He could not score a single goal or register an assist in WC knock-outs, again no ifs or buts here again. I cannot remember a single magical tournament where he shined like Muller, Beckenbauer, Cruyff, Stoichkov, Baggio, Romario, Modric, Messi, Pele, Maradona, Van Basten even James Rodriguez or Hagi.. none, the guy just tends to disappear at the biggest stage..
How do you explain that last 8 Copas were won by Brazil (3), Argentina, Chile (2), Colombia, Uruguay with Peru and Paraguay also playing finals?
How many of those players are still playing? How did those world giants do in the World Cup?
Yep, the insanity of a certain player's fans has reached another level after the World Cup.
It's not our fault that Europe created the nations league and play against each other all the time. Before that we used to face european teams quite a lot.
It only seems to be Argentina who, in the last 12 months, have played really low opposition.
Portugal already did by sending Ronaold to South AsiaWould love it if Portugal and Argentina went into a "who can arrange the most ridiculous FIFA recognized friendlies" competition between now and Messi/Ronaldo retiring
Of course he wasn't in the team of the tournament, he was eliminated in the last 16
Officially yes, but there is no pattern, let me show you how instead of cherry picking:
No he wasn't, Griezmann was. And neither was he player of the tournament, again Griezmann was. Reason: individually Ronaldo really struggled at the tournament. His only really good performance was vs Hungary. And Portugal won the final pretty much without him.
Something you should understand is that while Ronaldo's game is almost totally about scoring and getting the headlines, Messi has an allround ability that Ronaldo is not and has never ever been near to. Messi is not as selfish or obsessed about scoring as your idol. All this makes his stats much more impressive.Of course he wasn't in the team of the tournament, he was eliminated in the last 16
The last straw is strong.
Officially yes, but there is no pattern, let me show you how instead of cherry picking:
Let us remove the goal and games against the following teams: Luxembourg, Lithuania, Andorra, Armenia, Latvia, Estonia, Faroe islands, North Ireland, Azerbaijan, Cyprus, Kazakhstan, Liechtenstein, New Zealand, North Korea, Qatar, Albania, Canada, Cape Verde, China, Georgia, Mozambique, Curaçao, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Hong Kong, Jamaica, Nicaragua, UAE, Qatar, Trinidad & Tobago
It stands like this:
Ronaldo: 66 goals in 141 games (51 goals in 103 official games)
Messi: 78 goals in 159 games (54 goals in 119 official games)
So they're sort of even in goals/game, with Messi edging it in total but Ronaldo having done better in official games.
Now let us remove the following teams: Bolivia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Venezuela, Panama, Algeria, Australia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iran, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Slovenia, United States, Angola, Costa Rica, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Poland, Ireland, Romania, Finland, Israel, Morocco, Slovakia, Ukraine, Wales, Austria, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Norway, Turkey, South Africa
Ronaldo: 42 goals in 90 games (33 goals in 67 official games)
Messi: 41 goals in 86 games (23 goals in 62 official games)
The pattern is the same, Messi slightly edging it but not in competitive games.
Let us now remove: Mexico, Colombia, Nigeria, Switzerland, Serbia-Montenegro, Japan, Russia, South Korea, Sweden, Denmark, Cameroon, Czech Republic, Egypt, Ghana, Serbia, Ivory Coast
Ronaldo: 15 goals in 47 games (11 goals in 30 games)
Messi: 27 goals in 57 games (14 goals in 40 games)
Messi has scored signficantly more goals but in friendlies, they're on par in competitive games with a small edge towards Ronaldo.
Now let's do a different exercise: using only Copa/Euro + WC games
Ronaldo
Euro: 14 goals in 25 games (0.56 goals per game)
WC: 8 goals in 22 games (0.36 goals per game)
Total: 22 goals in 47 games (0.47 goals per game)
Messi
Copa: 13 goals in 34 games (0.38 goals per game)
WC: 13 goals in 26 games (0.5 goals per game)
Total: 26 goals in 60 games (0.43 goals per game)
So as can be concluded from above, imho, Ronaldo has been stat padding against weak teams just like Messi (and everyone else, it's not like they have had exceptionally unique weak opponents) and they are similar at all ranks of teams (at least if you consider official games).
In the big competitions Ronaldo has been doing fine actually, he scores more in these competitions than Messi actually, he is competent here and the stat padding theory (the new spin on the old and once discredited "he only scores against weak teams" criticism that happened earlier in his career) crumbles.
This is my subjective analysis of course and feel free to criticize it. If you're being honest you have to contextualise and analyse the whole data not just cherry picking points to prove your arguments. Again, I am prone to being subjective of course but I am transparent about it and the data above is of course there for everyone to see, I am trying (again, subjectvely) to base the argument on facts.
There's no cherry-picking here. Ronaldo is just useless in WCs knock-outs (0 goals+assists in 8 games) and against top rivals. He scored 7 goals in 33 games against WC winning nations meaning the guy suffers against such teams. Not only that, the guy suffers equally bad against Americans, so there goes your argument.Of course he wasn't in the team of the tournament, he was eliminated in the last 16
The last straw is strong.
Officially yes, but there is no pattern, let me show you how instead of cherry picking:
Let us remove the goal and games against the following teams: Luxembourg, Lithuania, Andorra, Armenia, Latvia, Estonia, Faroe islands, North Ireland, Azerbaijan, Cyprus, Kazakhstan, Liechtenstein, New Zealand, North Korea, Qatar, Albania, Canada, Cape Verde, China, Georgia, Mozambique, Curaçao, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Hong Kong, Jamaica, Nicaragua, UAE, Qatar, Trinidad & Tobago
It stands like this:
Ronaldo: 66 goals in 141 games (51 goals in 103 official games)
Messi: 78 goals in 159 games (54 goals in 119 official games)
So they're sort of even in goals/game, with Messi edging it in total but Ronaldo having done better in official games.
Now let us remove the following teams: Bolivia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Venezuela, Panama, Algeria, Australia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iran, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Slovenia, United States, Angola, Costa Rica, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Poland, Ireland, Romania, Finland, Israel, Morocco, Slovakia, Ukraine, Wales, Austria, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Norway, Turkey, South Africa
Ronaldo: 42 goals in 90 games (33 goals in 67 official games)
Messi: 41 goals in 86 games (23 goals in 62 official games)
The pattern is the same, Messi slightly edging it but not in competitive games.
Let us now remove: Mexico, Colombia, Nigeria, Switzerland, Serbia-Montenegro, Japan, Russia, South Korea, Sweden, Denmark, Cameroon, Czech Republic, Egypt, Ghana, Serbia, Ivory Coast
Ronaldo: 15 goals in 47 games (11 goals in 30 games)
Messi: 27 goals in 57 games (14 goals in 40 games)
Messi has scored signficantly more goals but in friendlies, they're on par in competitive games with a small edge towards Ronaldo.
Now let's do a different exercise: using only Copa/Euro + WC games
Ronaldo
Euro: 14 goals in 25 games (0.56 goals per game)
WC: 8 goals in 22 games (0.36 goals per game)
Total: 22 goals in 47 games (0.47 goals per game)
Messi
Copa: 13 goals in 34 games (0.38 goals per game)
WC: 13 goals in 26 games (0.5 goals per game)
Total: 26 goals in 60 games (0.43 goals per game)
So as can be concluded from above, imho, Ronaldo has been stat padding against weak teams just like Messi (and everyone else, it's not like they have had exceptionally unique weak opponents) and they are similar at all ranks of teams (at least if you consider official games).
In the big competitions Ronaldo has been doing fine actually, he scores more in these competitions than Messi actually, he is competent here and the stat padding theory (the new spin on the old and once discredited "he only scores against weak teams" criticism that happened earlier in his career) crumbles.
This is my subjective analysis of course and feel free to criticize it. If you're being honest you have to contextualise and analyse the whole data not just cherry picking points to prove your arguments. Again, I am prone to being subjective of course but I am transparent about it and the data above is of course there for everyone to see, I am trying (again, subjectvely) to base the argument on facts.
It has absolutely nothing to do with Messi. This conspiracy theory is laughable especially given the fact that Messi isnt obsessed with scoring unlike the Portuguese guy.
:quality(85)//cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/infobae/DLRU5FGSKVCELE5KXASLCKO2JY.jpg)
Yes, in the build up to a World Cup, the biggest tournament in football, the AFA and Scaloni are most concerned about arranging fixtures that will get Messi easy goals. The small matter of actually preparing for the tournament, trying different players, formations etc. is neither here nor there.
If that happens, he would go there as the last WC winner & best player plus probably with a new Ballon D'or unlike Ronaldo "the reject" who was basically rejected by every single top club in Europe despite his desperate attempts to remain in Europe finally ending up in South Africa.
