Cristiano Ronaldo

comment by Isle of Manc - Year of the Januzaj (U18323)
posted 37 minutes ago
comment by Edinspur (U1109)
posted 21 minutes ago
Goals are just as skewed as assists are. An assist like Jay Rodriguez's is so much more impressive than a penalty, or a tap in
-------------------------------------
You're comparing the best type of assist to the worst type of goal here.

Is taking a corner kick any better than putting away a penalty? You should compare James' assist yesterday to a 30 yard strike out of nowhere. I still feel goals are more impressive because for every quality assist there's a good run and finish from another player. Goals can come unassisted though, where the player does practically all the work.
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Just no.

The point was that people kick up a fuss about 'skewed' assist statistics, whereas in reality both goals and assist statistics can be skewed. Ramsey's first goal of the season was ridiculously unimpressive, but it was still a goal. Tom Carrol's pass to Bale who then hit a screamer from 30 yards to win 3-2 vs West Ham was also ridiculously unimpressive. I was saying that you cant belittle one and credit the other.

I know you were. I was just saying I think goals are more impressive than assists.

Two players can play the exact same pass to different players and one ends up with an assist and the other doesn't. Through no fault of their own either. High assist stats generally require quality players around you.

A goal is a goal no matter what. If you miss, you don't end up with one, and if you put it in, you get the credit. It's simple and straightforward.

Two players can hit the exact same shot, and depending on the quality of the keeper. One can have success and one cant. One player can con a good goal scoring career by taking penalties *cough* Mario *cough* and people suddenly think that is impressive and prolific.

Give him credit for what he is; a goalscorer of phenomenal consistency and unerring clinical regularity, the likes of which we've not seen in our lifetimes and may never see again.

The greatest footballer of this era or of any other era he just isn't. He's not better than Messi who, for a few years, has been able to keep pace with him as a goalscorer in both ratio and actual numbers, and beyond that is just the better footballer in terms of his other traits and innate footballing qualities. Ronaldo has him beat in athleticism; he jumps higher and runs faster and is obviously the more powerful physical specimen.

Neither are the greatest to ever play the game.

Two players can hit the exact same shot, and depending on the quality of the keeper. One can have success and one cant. One player can con a good goal scoring career by taking penalties *cough* Mario *cough* and people suddenly think that is impressive and prolific.

____________

You are right but both player won't face same team year long.

Neither are the greatest to ever play the game
-----------------------------
Who is in your opinion?

"With our defence I don't fear Ronaldo and his skill set. He won't beat Courtois with a shot from 40 yards and he won't leave Azipi or Ivanovic for dead, he won't beat Terry in the air either."

Deluded clown. I remember Chelsea barely being able to cope with Miralles. Wtf is Ronaldo gonna do to you. Mug.

Dubbed, I've news for you. The first cash machine installed in Mogadishu.

"Who is in your opinion?"
===========================================
Hard to decide, to be honest (which I'm aware is a bit of a cop-out, given my statement), but if pushed on the matter, my favorites, given all that I believe it to encompass would be Cruyff and Platini.

Platini, I'm more than aware I'm probably alone in choosing but when you factor in the league he dominated (an Italian league as defensively laden as anything before or since and he shone, from midfield, like no other), the complete footballing attacking unit he was (he was a goalscorer, a creator, a midfield dictator of pace, he was about 3-4 players - Pirlo, Scholes, Falcao and Fabregas in one magnifcent French package) and the complete control and command he had with the ball at his feet whether driving forward with it or manipulating it in a way to make those around him, as good as they were, infinitely better (his will of personality and outright skill forced Juventus to turn an already relentless winning machine into an even more relentless winning machine with flamboyance and cultured thrust) I'd be more than happy to argue his corner for certainly being up there.

Cruyff doesn't really require my tubthumping as everyone knows just how complete a football he was and the kind of football he was pretty much the everything for.

Pele and Maradona of course too and Zidane is simply the most uniquely creative force I think I'll ever see.

Going back further and this is one's based almost entirely on text and grainy footage, Raymond Kopa (I seemingly have a hard-on for the French) is another favorite whom I believe is criminally overlooked as he was a player who's technique, like a Garincha or Pele, when you compare it to those around him at the time is light years ahead of those whom he's playing against. I always hold massive favor for those who despite being products of their time, completely supersede the norms that litter the era - kind of like Ronaldo and Messi do in this one when looking at their stats.

Apologies for turning that into something of a meander.

Didn't really watch Cruyff in his day, but I did see enough of Platini to reasonably compare him to my personal all-time fave, Maradona.

Platini was indeed an awesome midfielder with an end product almost any striker would love to claim for himself, but I personally think you have to take into account the platforms he played off - with France, arguably one of the two best int'l midfields I've ever seen, and Juve, the richest club in world football in his day. No doubt he improved the players around him but as you said yourself, the Giresses, Tiganas and Fernandezs were by no means mugs, quite the opposite, they were all great players in their own right.

Maradona imo was never really surrounded by the wealth of riches Platini had to play off, either for Argentina or at Napoli, and was the shining light of what imo is perhaps the strongest league competition in my lifetime.

Discussions over the actual strength of the sides Maradona played in have been done to death, and I have and will always say that they were no way as poor as most Maradona fans would have you believe, but when you look at the Serie A of Maradona's time it really does take your breath away - the Milan side of the late 80s, the stelat cast of the Inter side led by another (imo) criminally underrated footballer in Lotthar Matthaus, the still-formidable Juve team, strong Roma sides, the rising star of Sampdoria etc....,

But beyond all of those factors, there's a much more simple reason that has more to do with personal preferences than anything else. I'd simply say that watching Maradona was for me a mesmerising experience that no other player has ever equalled. Ronaldo Naz, Zizou or Dinho might run him close in different aspects of their games, but none of them imo brought together quite the same spellbinding package of ball control, dribbling, vision, finishing etc. at a time when, comparatively to later eras, defences (no different to Platini's day btw) pretty much had a license to kill.