It just shows their greatness and they are truly in a level of their own as compared to the rest.
Messi v Ronaldo | Contains double your daily salt allowance
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik and Imran hold a long overdue conversation about United's awful league form with 1 win in 7. They discuss a disappointing draw at Bournemouth, a not so disappointing draw against Liverpool and a crushing defeat at Chelsea - Is time nearly over for Erik Ten Hag?
Then in a special second half of the pod, Nik welcomes Natalie ( https://twitter.com/natalie_17) to discuss the fortunes of Manchester United Women as they booked a place in the FA Cup Final after a historic first ever win vs. Chelsea.
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Messi is the better footballer, Ronaldo is the better athlete. Both all time greats & its we’re fortunate that we’ve got to see them in their prime at the same time. I think future generations will talk about them how we see Pele.
Gonna list the years from 2007-now (where both hit world class levels) and say who was better in a particular calendar year. My opinion, based slightly around stats but not entirely, taking style of play at the time, and trophies into account too. Just doing this to gauge who really is the best of all time, because I honestly can’t make up my mind. This isn’t a planned post - I love both players.
2007 - Ronaldo: Won the PL
2008 - Ronaldo: Won the PL and CL
2009 - Messi: Won the sextuple
2010 - Messi: Won La Liga and Copa Del Rey
2011 - Messi: Won La Liga and CL
2012 - Messi: Lost La Liga to Ronaldo, but 91 goals
2013 - Messi: Won La Liga
2014 - Ronaldo: Won Copa Del Rey and CL
2015 - Messi: Won the treble
2016 - Ronaldo: Won the CL and Euros
2017 - Messi: Lost the league in CL to Ronaldo, but outperformed him in all statistics by far.
2018 - Ronaldo: Won the CL
2019 - Messi: Won La Liga
2020 - Ronaldo: Won Serie A, 31 goals in the league
2021 - Messi by far so far, probably a bit unfair to include because Ronaldo has clearly dipped massively having reached his peak quicker than Messi as a result of being two years older.
So in total, score is 8-6 in Messi’s favour if we exclude 2021. Decision made
Feels about right, as the worldwide general consensus seems to be that Messi is slightly superior to Ronaldo. Obviously different ways to gauge, mind.
2007 - Ronaldo: Won the PL
2008 - Ronaldo: Won the PL and CL
2009 - Messi: Won the sextuple
2010 - Messi: Won La Liga and Copa Del Rey
2011 - Messi: Won La Liga and CL
2012 - Messi: Lost La Liga to Ronaldo, but 91 goals
2013 - Messi: Won La Liga
2014 - Ronaldo: Won Copa Del Rey and CL
2015 - Messi: Won the treble
2016 - Ronaldo: Won the CL and Euros
2017 - Messi: Lost the league in CL to Ronaldo, but outperformed him in all statistics by far.
2018 - Ronaldo: Won the CL
2019 - Messi: Won La Liga
2020 - Ronaldo: Won Serie A, 31 goals in the league
2021 - Messi by far so far, probably a bit unfair to include because Ronaldo has clearly dipped massively having reached his peak quicker than Messi as a result of being two years older.
So in total, score is 8-6 in Messi’s favour if we exclude 2021. Decision made
Feels about right, as the worldwide general consensus seems to be that Messi is slightly superior to Ronaldo. Obviously different ways to gauge, mind.Nothing personal, but that way of assessing is just so sad to see. It sums up what's wrong with this discussion IMO. I know we had this debate in another context, I believe regarding Messi vs. Lewandowski, Kane, Mbappe this season, but you really reduce it completely to statistics and trophies. That seems just so superficial and unrewarding to me.Gonna list the years from 2007-now (where both hit world class levels) and say who was better in a particular calendar year. My opinion, based slightly around stats but not entirely, taking style of play at the time, and trophies into account too. Just doing this to gauge who really is the best of all time, because I honestly can’t make up my mind. This isn’t a planned post - I love both players.
2007 - Ronaldo: Won the PL
2008 - Ronaldo: Won the PL and CL
2009 - Messi: Won the sextuple
2010 - Messi: Won La Liga and Copa Del Rey
2011 - Messi: Won La Liga and CL
2012 - Messi: Lost La Liga to Ronaldo, but 91 goals
2013 - Messi: Won La Liga
2014 - Ronaldo: Won Copa Del Rey and CL
2015 - Messi: Won the treble
2016 - Ronaldo: Won the CL and Euros
2017 - Messi: Lost the league in CL to Ronaldo, but outperformed him in all statistics by far.
2018 - Ronaldo: Won the CL
2019 - Messi: Won La Liga
2020 - Ronaldo: Won Serie A, 31 goals in the league
2021 - Messi by far so far, probably a bit unfair to include because Ronaldo has clearly dipped massively having reached his peak quicker than Messi as a result of being two years older.
So in total, score is 8-6 in Messi’s favour if we exclude 2021. Decision made
I hope that someday there'll be a holistic metric to capture and quantify the overall impact a player has so that we can move on from goals and assists. It would still be frustrating I believe but definitely better than this. This currently feels like ranking the quality of musicians based on records sold.
Perhaps the best measurement now is the number of MoM awarded to them in the same period of time, in the same/similar competitions. Not the most ideal I will admit, but this is to be used to compare 2 freaks who should outperform their peers on the pitch.
I don’t think it is. Contrary to what people think, imo statistics and trophies are two-thirds of what makes football, and sport, great, entertainment being the other third. We debated Messi vs Lewandowski and you used all sorts of intangibles, but I kept backing Lewandowski, simply because he has more than a goal per game this season. That’s remarkable. Fans talk about leadership, players driving his whole team on etc, and for me, that can only be used when assessing particular games.
In comparing players, all that we can really go by to actually convince people and come to conclusions is statistics and trophies, relative to the team they play for. Don’t really understand why you think it’s unrewarding tbh; the best players all work towards having the best stats and most trophies. Players don’t take pride and joy from looking back at the way they dragged an average team through a few games, they take pride in doing something like scoring 50 goals a season.
Well, I couldn't disagree more with that. It's a overly simplistic view and illogical on top of it.
And I say this as a stats guy. I'm working with large data sets every day. I develop own KPIs, I do A/B tests, test for significances, work on algorithms, automations and all this stuff. I know how statistical comparisons work and how small details and external effects can render a profound comparison impossible. With that in mind, reading this thread is almost painful. It already begins with the metric: Goal record is totally unfit to analyze the attacking impact of a player. It's an awful metric, truly irrational. But even if it was a great KPI the way people compare it is just completely dumb. They don't even attempt to factor in external effects that are undeniably messing with the data. In the end, comparing Messi's and Ronaldo's goal records is like comparing apples and oranges.
This is just frustrating. This isn't even about opinion, what you guys do with the stats is objectively absolute nonsense. What's even more frustrating is that there are already much, much better statistical models available and few seem to care.
Also going by this metric, Henry was a better player than Zidane, Eto'o a better player than Ronaldinho, Gerd Müller a better player than Beckenbauer and so forth.
Could not disagree more with this. You’re the only person I’ve ever seen/talked to who thinks goals and assists are not a good, in fact, a very bad way to compare attackers/strikers. Messi and Ronaldo played either from the wing or as a striker (false 9 in Messi’s case) throughout their respective primes, and you’re saying they shouldn’t be compared with goals and assists. I genuinely don’t understand your point whatsoever. Do enlighten me on those metrics you speak about as well. XG, XA, goals per game, style of play of their teams?
Also, in regards to the bolded bit, you could not have picked more different types of players to compare if you tried. Ronaldinho vs Eto’o is confusing already, but Muller vs Beckenbauer is just an awful example. Most renowned poacher in history vs possibly the best sweeper in history. They played 70 yards apart every game
The difficult thing in football isn't getting the ball into the net, it's getting the ball past the opponent players. xGC and packing rate are probably the best statistics I can think of. And even they need to be analyzed in context. You can't for example just analyze Ronaldo's scoring stats in isolation when comparing him with other players. You also have to factor in in which games he scored his goals, how big the difference in quality was, how much his team scores in general etc.Could not disagree more with this. You’re the only person I’ve ever seen/talked to who thinks goals and assists are not a good, in fact, a very bad way to compare attackers/strikers. Messi and Ronaldo played either from the wing or as a striker (false 9 in Messi’s case) throughout their respective primes, and you’re saying they shouldn’t be compared with goals and assists. I genuinely don’t understand your point whatsoever. Do enlighten me on those metrics you speak about as well. XG, XA, goals per game, style of play of their teams?
Also, in regards to the bolded bit, you could not have picked more different types of players to compare if you tried. Ronaldinho vs Eto’o is confusing already, but Muller vs Beckenbauer is just an awful example. Most renowned poacher in history vs possibly the best sweeper in history. They played 70 yards apart every game
You compare the goal record of player A with the goal record of player B as if it was a clean A/B test in which you only change one variable. But in fact you're changing dozens if not hundreds.
And yes, you can't compare Messi's goal stats with Cristiano's goal stats because both play completely different positions and always have. Messi's average position is much deeper than Ronaldo's. Usually when he picks up the ball, he has 4-5 players ahead of him. Messi also scores from atypical striker positions, resulting in him beating his xG by ridiculous amounts.
| since 2014/15 | Goals | xGoals | Assists | xAssists |
| Messi | 224 | 186 (-38) | 96 | 103 (+7) |
| Cristiano | 209 | 201 (-8) | 54 | 47 (-7) |
Which shows that Messi a) has less expected goals than Cristiano but still outscores him (=better finishing) and b) creates chances of higher quality but his team mates are worse than the average at converting them. But those are only one small part of the whole picture. If you analyze all the stats available (heat maps, dribbling stats, passing stats, shot stats, xG, xA, xGC, etc.) it just shows that Messi and Ronaldo are players of completely different profiles.
That's what I mean. It's not a clean comparison, it's a very one sided one that systematically grants one player an advantage by putting too much weight on one statistic.
And as I said, it's not even a good one. Goals are defined as the last touch before the ball passes the line. It can be a tap in, it can be a 30 yard screamer, it can be a dribbling, a header, whatever. It says nothing about the quality or difficulty of the play. That alone disqualifies it.
Much better new bust of that Ronaldo guy, and I swear I see a bit of Beckham in it.
good post
Great video for those who havn't seen it.
Río Ferdinand telling truth bombs.
Fantastic. Best post in thread. Opened up a new way of looking at stats.
Thanks
How was Messi last night?
You mean the guy you recently wished was disabled?
He wasn't particularly good by his standards.
Voted Ronaldo but both are incredible players.
This is all very nice and good if you work at a football club and want to maximize the return you get from your transfer budget. But we don't have that job, we are football fans, and we experience the sport in a very different way. We are always going to care more about goals and trophies because the rules of the sport are that you win games by scoring goals and you win trophies by winning games. The best statistical model in the world is never really going to matter in these discussions unless those statistics go up in the scoreboard at the end of games.
Two, please
Athletic Club de Bilbao are 11th in La Liga.
Updated list:
736 goals
309 assists
Better goal/match ratio
Better assist/match ratio
35 trophies
55 freekicks
54 hattricks
50 league goals in a season
73 goals all competitions in a season
91 goals in a calendar year
7 Pichichi
6 Golden Boot
6 Ballon d'Or
1 World Cup Golden Ball
6 FIFA Best Player
2 UEFA Best Player
Goalscorer and playmaker
Messi >>>>>>>> Ronaldo
736 goals
309 assists
Better goal/match ratio
Better assist/match ratio
35 trophies
55 freekicks
54 hattricks
50 league goals in a season
73 goals all competitions in a season
91 goals in a calendar year
7 Pichichi
6 Golden Boot
6 Ballon d'Or
1 World Cup Golden Ball
6 FIFA Best Player
2 UEFA Best Player
Goalscorer and playmaker
Messi >>>>>>>> Ronaldo
And yet, they were in a cup final.
and knocked out Real Madrid
but jokes aside, yeah it’s not a top 5 team in the world or anything
I thought Real Madrid were knocked out by Alcoyano?
But a Cup is a Cup and a final is a final.
yes sir
oops! You’re right my bad
Again this shows how deep Messi often receives the ball when starting a attack. It's amazing he can score so many goals without being a pure striker.
Brilliant. He’s one of the best players of all time and had the best calendar year (2012) of all time, but there’s no better version of Messi than the guy who plays against Bilbao in the Copa Del Rey final
Speak for yourself, not for others. It used to be different before all these superficial comparisons started and there are still enough people who watch the sport and enjoy all parts of it, not only the last three touches.
If your argument needs so much simplification, you're doing something wrong.
Look at this goal and the brilliance of the touches in his own half. Those won't show in any of your statistics yet they are the game changers. If you don't rate such stuff, football must be incredible dull for you.
I remember when the poll had an equal number of votes for each player.
I am not getting into the whole Messi vs. Ronaldo thing, but reducing Gerd Müller to poacher status is an incredible injustice. He was so much more than that.Also, in regards to the bolded bit, you could not have picked more different types of players to compare if you tried. Ronaldinho vs Eto’o is confusing already, but Muller vs Beckenbauer is just an awful example. Most renowned poacher in history vs possibly the best sweeper in history. They played 70 yards apart every game
I wasn’t born when he played. I was going by what everyone says and his sublime goal record.
Yeah to be honest, Neymar was the 3rd best player in the world until he went to France away from the easy team mates and systems of Barcelona.
Neymar has been meh in a different league; going down the levels of the worlds best players, Ronaldo has been meh in a different league and all this Messi riders think he will be amazing where ever he goes. Just delusional.
You want more examples? Hazard has been meh in a different league. Coutinho being a 100 mil player has been meh. Dembele another 100 mil player? what about Havertz? All these players gets found out when moving leagues. Zlatan in Spain?
Now no one is saying Messi is going to be non existent, but he isnt going to be good as he is in Barcelona and in Spain. AKA not the performances of the GOAT of Barcelona.
At least the myth of CR7 being able to carry a midtable team can die
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