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Football's greatest - where does Lionel Messi rank?


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Better with his bad foot. Better in the air. Better at penalties I'd say too.

Aye, Messi is better at dribbling, passing, creating, shooting, basically everything that matters for a player in their position

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:lol: What the fuck Mojo? "If you took goals out of it." Aye I'm sure if you take goals out of a forwards game it might affect how they're seen. Goals win games.

 

A few people are being a bit silly with the distance between the players.

Messi is absolutely miles better than Ronaldo. Tell me one way in which Ronaldo is a better player. Messi is better at almost everything by a mile. I posted this article during the world cup but it is worth putting up again. Please read this Froggy http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/lionel-messi-is-impossible/

 

This is hyperbole and pretty much cements Froggy's point. :lol:

Just read the article, Messi is miles better at almost everything important

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Guest firetotheworks

I dunno why Froggy's kicking off about the 'ignoring goals' point as if making it about goals puts Ronaldo ahead. It doesn't, Messi has a better record. :lol:

 

Somewhere out there Ronaldo's thinking 'ffs, Froggy's fighting my corner, maybe Messi really is better than me.'

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To be fair it is a bit daft to say stats are meaningless when you are describing a forward consistantly scoring 50 goals a season. It's a very strange the way the Messi fans will use any angle to try and discredit Ronaldo like he's not one of the best players of all time. A poacher and 20 assists a season don't count because they are cutbacks, howay man :lol:

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Guest DebuchyAndTheBeast

Messi being the best in the world and maybe the all time greatest wouldn't be possible if he wasn't playing for a team which often averages more than 60% of possession. So he chases the ball less and sometimes he even has the luxury of being the player who covers less ground on the pitch (maybe VI can confirm or deny that for me  :lol:) . Make no mistake he is the best in the world but only when associated with Barcelona. Put him in our team  :lol: and he would look like a totally different player. So I think it's logical to take Ronaldo who is more versatile and wouldn't need a specific setup to get the best out of him.

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Messi being the best in the world and maybe the all time greatest wouldn't be possible if he wasn't playing for a team which often averages more than 60% of possession. So he chases the ball less and sometimes he even has the luxury of being the player who covers less ground on the pitch (maybe VI can confirm or deny that for me  :lol:) . Make no mistake he is the best in the world but only when associated with Barcelona. Put him in our team  :lol: and he would look like a totally different player. So I think it's logical to take Ronaldo who is more versatile and wouldn't need a specific setup to get the best out of him.

 

Alternatively, Real Madrid's explosive counter attack style (or at least it being one of their clear strengths) suits Ronaldo nicely.

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Ronaldo's much more than a goalscorer man.

 

I'm sure his assists over that period would put him in the top 5 in Europe, easily. Ronaldo was the difference in the CL QF. Important contribution again yesterday. People always under-rate him. No, he doesn't have that #10 element to his game but he does have the ability to play like a devastating winger. Attacking defences, crosses & cut-backs.

 

Aye, Messi is probably slightly better. But Ronaldo is insane. Over the last 20 years, his consistency is only surpassed or matched by one person.

 

You've invented that argument in order to make that point, so I'm not sure what the point was. The exact point that was being made was that Ronaldo cannot do the things that Messi does, there's no 'but' beyond that because that was the entire basis of the point. 

 

Messi can't do some of the things Ronaldo does. That would be the case when discussing all-time greats.

 

That's where the dribbling past 4 or 5 players and scoring > dominating in the air debate comes into play. What Ronaldo can't do, that Messi can do is more impressive and harder imo. I think that's where the huge difference is.

 

KI nails it here.

 

Safe to say a lot comes down to personal preference and what you prefer in a player.

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I, for one, prefer CRonaldo.

 

Both brilliant though. Which is probably the main point here as it's rather impossible to actually prove one is better than the other. Which means it's basically down to personal preference between two of the greatest footballers we've seen at the end of the day.

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Messi being the best in the world and maybe the all time greatest wouldn't be possible if he wasn't playing for a team which often averages more than 60% of possession. So he chases the ball less and sometimes he even has the luxury of being the player who covers less ground on the pitch (maybe VI can confirm or deny that for me  :lol:) . Make no mistake he is the best in the world but only when associated with Barcelona. Put him in our team  :lol: and he would look like a totally different player. So I think it's logical to take Ronaldo who is more versatile and wouldn't need a specific setup to get the best out of him.

As if Ronaldo would shine playing for our joke of a team

 

Those that discredit Messi for playing for Barca ignore that Ronaldo has played for 2 massive clubs, not like he has excelled at some small team

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Guest DebuchyAndTheBeast

Messi being the best in the world and maybe the all time greatest wouldn't be possible if he wasn't playing for a team which often averages more than 60% of possession. So he chases the ball less and sometimes he even has the luxury of being the player who covers less ground on the pitch (maybe VI can confirm or deny that for me  :lol:) . Make no mistake he is the best in the world but only when associated with Barcelona. Put him in our team  :lol: and he would look like a totally different player. So I think it's logical to take Ronaldo who is more versatile and wouldn't need a specific setup to get the best out of him.

 

Alternatively, Real Madrid's explosive counter attack style (or at least it being one of their clear strengths) suits Ronaldo nicely.

 

which 99% of teams in the world can play to a certain extent. Ronaldo does indeed benefit from being the main man but not as much as Messi.

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:lol: What the fuck Mojo? "If you took goals out of it." Aye I'm sure if you take goals out of a forwards game it might affect how they're seen. Goals win games.

 

A few people are being a bit silly with the distance between the players.

 

Fuck you on about froggy?  They both score mountains of fucking goals, Messi more than Ronaldo for a lot of their careers unless I'm mistaken?  The point was about why people consider Messi the much better player and I was saying if you ignored the goals and looked at the rest of their game you'd see why.

 

I mean you could never split them on goals, Ronaldo scores 65 and Messi 63 in a season or whatever...there's nothing between them there :lol:

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Guest firetotheworks

To be fair it is a bit daft to say stats are meaningless when you are describing a forward consistantly scoring 50 goals a season. It's a very strange the way the Messi fans will use any angle to try and discredit Ronaldo like he's not one of the best players of all time. A poacher and 20 assists a season don't count because they are cutbacks, howay man :lol:

Why would anyone that prefers Messi discredit stats when Messi's are better?

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To be fair it is a bit daft to say stats are meaningless when you are describing a forward consistantly scoring 50 goals a season. It's a very strange the way the Messi fans will use any angle to try and discredit Ronaldo like he's not one of the best players of all time. A poacher and 20 assists a season don't count because they are cutbacks, howay man :lol:

Why would anyone that prefers Messi discredit stats when Messi's are better?

 

I think this cuts to the heart of the debate tbh - Ronaldo is seen as a goalscorer first and foremost, despite having very good assist numbers.  Messi more than matches Ronaldo's goal statistics but is also probably the best number 10 in the world and can run and control a game as a playmaker, which Ronaldo simply cannot do. 

 

That's it right there.

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Ronalso is an athlete though, there's plenty of contemparies with better technique, iniesta etc. No offence froggy but would you be as big a ronaldo fan if he didn't play for man u

 

"Technique" is such a vague term. Ronaldo's first touch is just as good as Iniesta's if not better. The amount of times he has to control a football at full speed, while either jostling with a defender or trying out outrun him is crazy and he does it perfectly. Some of the technique displayed in his finishing is something else. This vague "technique" crap is FM talk.

 

You also have to consider the majority of his formation had Ronaldo playing as a winger and Messi as #10 and it's reflected in their style of play. With Ronaldo you have to get the ball to him and he'll lok to be  devastating in the final third. Messi can get more engaged in the game true. But Ronaldo has often had big impacts in games he hasn't scored in. I don't think he got an assist for a couple of the goals on Sunday for example but his runs made a great contribution to getting a couple goals.

 

 

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To be fair it is a bit daft to say stats are meaningless when you are describing a forward consistantly scoring 50 goals a season. It's a very strange the way the Messi fans will use any angle to try and discredit Ronaldo like he's not one of the best players of all time. A poacher and 20 assists a season don't count because they are cutbacks, howay man :lol:

Why would anyone that prefers Messi discredit stats when Messi's are better?

 

I think this cuts to the heart of the debate tbh - Ronaldo is seen as a goalscorer first and foremost, despite having very good assist numbers.  Messi more than matches Ronaldo's goal statistics but is also probably the best number 10 in the world and can run and control a game as a playmaker, which Ronaldo simply cannot do. 

 

That's it right there.

 

It's not though is it. Messi's very best games have come by scoring in the clutch. He's not had to playmake for the majority of his Barcelona career. In the World Cup his impact came in the form of goals. He's never had a performance like Zidane vs. Portugal where he just ran the match against really top opposition in a massive game. Didn't come close to anything like that in the WC.

 

 

On another note, I do agree this Real Madrid side over the last couple of years has been by far the best Ronaldo has played in and it's helped him tremendously.

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Guest firetotheworks

Bringing international games into is always going to be contentious, Zidane was in a great French team that won things, had Messi chosen to play for Spain and not Argentina, Messi would probably have a greater claim to being the best ever, perhaps wrongly just based on that. Ronaldo is about as effective for Portugal as Messi is for Argentina, it's an odd one. Messi just looked disinterested in that World Cup Final, there's no getting away from that, but I don't take the World Cup as the zenith anymore, that's the Champions League now imo. There's no higher level than that. Maybe in time there'll be an international equivalent as well, which would be brilliant.

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Bringing international games into is always going to be contentious, Zidane was in a great French team that won things, had Messi chosen to play for Spain and not Argentina, Messi would probably have a greater claim to being the best ever, perhaps wrongly just based on that. Ronaldo is about as effective for Portugal as Messi is for Argentina, it's an odd one. Messi just looked disinterested in that World Cup Final, there's no getting away from that, but I don't take the World Cup as the zenith anymore, that's the Champions League now imo. There's no higher level than that. Maybe in time there'll be an international equivalent as well, which would be brilliant.

 

The World Cup will always be the zenith for players coming from big footballing countries for me, no matter how I look at it. It's a much harder competition to win since it's only every 4 years and players have to perform at systems they most of the time aren't as comfortable with as it's different from their clubs. I mean you could win the CL 10 times during your career even if that's extremely unlikely of ever happening, but it'd be impossible to win 10 world cups. I mean, I know the CL has a higher level of football but the World Cup is still harder to win as you have to be at your best for many games in a short period of time.

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Bringing international games into is always going to be contentious, Zidane was in a great French team that won things, had Messi chosen to play for Spain and not Argentina, Messi would probably have a greater claim to being the best ever, perhaps wrongly just based on that. Ronaldo is about as effective for Portugal as Messi is for Argentina, it's an odd one. Messi just looked disinterested in that World Cup Final, there's no getting away from that, but I don't take the World Cup as the zenith anymore, that's the Champions League now imo. There's no higher level than that. Maybe in time there'll be an international equivalent as well, which would be brilliant.

 

I'm talking strictly play-making perfomances. If he played for Spain he wouldn't have that responsibility either. IN the last 2 world cups he's played #10 (could be wrong about '10). One he looked very good as a #10 but didn't have a tremendous impact - the other he scored vital goals but wasn't widely influential. I think in recent memory - Zidane, Riquelme, Ozil & Rodriguez have had truly impressive world cups as #10. I don't think Messi has done that.

 

I haven't watched a Copa so I can't comment on that. But while Messi does possess several qualities of a #10 - he rarely controls a top level game playing that role.

Denying Messi isn't a world class number ten now huh? Right enough :lol:

 

How often has he played the position? He's spent the majority of the last few years as a false #9. Sure that has elements of #10 but it isn't the same thing. Like Ronaldo it's his amazing goalscoring and assisting record that separates him from contemporaries and other greats in history. His playmaking abilities could separate him from Cronaldo. Messi would certainly be a better traditional winger than Ronaldo could do as a #10.

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Bringing international games into is always going to be contentious, Zidane was in a great French team that won things, had Messi chosen to play for Spain and not Argentina, Messi would probably have a greater claim to being the best ever, perhaps wrongly just based on that. Ronaldo is about as effective for Portugal as Messi is for Argentina, it's an odd one. Messi just looked disinterested in that World Cup Final, there's no getting away from that, but I don't take the World Cup as the zenith anymore, that's the Champions League now imo. There's no higher level than that. Maybe in time there'll be an international equivalent as well, which would be brilliant.

 

The World Cup will always be the zenith for players coming from big footballing countries for me, no matter how I look at it. It's a much harder competition to win since it's only every 4 years and players have to perform at systems they most of the time aren't as comfortable with as it's different from their clubs. I mean you could win the CL 10 times during your career even if that's extremely unlikely of ever happening, but it'd be impossible to win 10 world cups. I mean, I know the CL has a higher level of football but the World Cup is still harder to win as you have to be at your best for many games in a short period of time.

 

Also slightly easier to have an individual impact in the WC than the CL. The CL allows for greater synergy in a team. Although that's been reflected in international competition with the last two winners having the majority of their team from single clubs.

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Guest firetotheworks

Messi rarely controls top level games playing in that role? He's changed the role single-handedly because of his strengths, there would be literally no point in him playing the #10 role in the same way that someone like Zidane played it, the way he plays in that position is way more devastating than anything Zidane, Riquelme etc played it. Messi's exceptional as a winger/inside forward, a false #9, a #10 and when he comes deep and starts playing more like Xavi. He dominates in his own way and has done so at the very top level (except for the World Cup final, admittedly)

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Guest firetotheworks

Bringing international games into is always going to be contentious, Zidane was in a great French team that won things, had Messi chosen to play for Spain and not Argentina, Messi would probably have a greater claim to being the best ever, perhaps wrongly just based on that. Ronaldo is about as effective for Portugal as Messi is for Argentina, it's an odd one. Messi just looked disinterested in that World Cup Final, there's no getting away from that, but I don't take the World Cup as the zenith anymore, that's the Champions League now imo. There's no higher level than that. Maybe in time there'll be an international equivalent as well, which would be brilliant.

 

The World Cup will always be the zenith for players coming from big footballing countries for me, no matter how I look at it. It's a much harder competition to win since it's only every 4 years and players have to perform at systems they most of the time aren't as comfortable with as it's different from their clubs. I mean you could win the CL 10 times during your career even if that's extremely unlikely of ever happening, but it'd be impossible to win 10 world cups. I mean, I know the CL has a higher level of football but the World Cup is still harder to win as you have to be at your best for many games in a short period of time.

 

The answer to this question is George Best. If Messi had become a Spanish player (as he very nearly did) would you think he was better than he is now for having been part of that Spanish team?

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