When Tiger Woods came onto the scene and nobody had ever witnessed his likes before the authorities tried to keep golf competitive by “Tiger-proofing” courses.

Woods was winning so big and so often that many famous courses were lengthened in the vain hope that Woods’ vicious power would be somehow neutralised.

Woods was dominating to such an extent that they altered the very terrain he was playing on just so other competitors might have a shot at anything other than second place.

Tiger-proofing is not available in football.


The laws of the game cannot be altered simply because one player or another is simply too good for the rest. There is no way to handicap the best because the rest aren’t of their standard.

It means that Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are the only two Tigers in town playing against prey. They have between them been so good for so long that it is almost impossible to keep the achievements of those who have gone before them or come along during their respective careers in perspective.


Ronaldo and Messi have made us reassess the definition of what a great player is and what a great player does.

There is a natural tendency on the part of listeners to rank the music of their youth as the best. The same happens with footballers. A few years ago, if you’d asked anyone who was a teenager in the 60s who the best footballer was the answer would have been George Best or Pele. A child of the 70s would have offered Johan Cruyff. Those who grew up in the 80s might have said Michel Platini. A 90s child was spoilt for choice with Ronaldo and Zinedine Zidane chief among the best of that age. A few years later and it was Ronaldinho running the show.

Then something seriously disorientating happened. Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi came of age. They were objectively better than any player who’d gone before.

They have over the course of a decade rendered redundant all prior individual footballing achievement. It is as if the records set by players like Alfredo Di Stefano, Paulino Alcantara, Gerd Muller and everybody else were set solely to be destroyed by Ronaldo and Messi.


Once upon a time a striker would have been regarded as an all-time great at his club for a goalscoring record of one in every two matches. Ronaldo’s is better than one in one since he joined Real Madrid. Messi’s is damn close throughout his Barcelona days.

The rate of improvement that both have given to the art of goalscoring should have taken decades or centuries. Donald Lippincott, an American, ran the first IAAF 100 metre world sprint record in 1912. He did it in a time of 10.6 seconds. The current record was set by Usain Bolt in 9.58. That’s an improvement of around 11 per cent in 97 years.

Raul was Real Madrid’s record goalscorer before Ronaldo came along. He scored 323 goals in 741 games. By all accounts that is astonishing. The consistency, the stamina required to play 741 games for Real Madrid is tough enough but to add a goal roughly once every two games is something else altogether.


Ronaldo knocked off 324 goals in 310 games. That is an improvement of more than 100 per cent – not across centuries or decades – but just a few short seasons after Raul set the record.

Messi shattered Alcantara’s Barcelona goalscoring record in 2014 which had stood for 87 years.


It is pointless to try to list the other records they hold between them. Suffice to say, it’s everything. For club, country, in continental competition, in domestic competition, whatever. The names on the top of every goalscoring list once read like a cornucopia of all-time greats. Now it’s just Ronaldos and Messis everywhere.

Between them they have won the last nine Ballons D’Or – Messi has five and Ronaldo four. They have been runner-up nine times between them too. Once upon a time players dreamed of winning it once – like Ronaldinho, Best or Zidane - or maybe twice like Ronaldo, Di Stefano or Franz Beckenbauer.

The truly great might have got their hands on three like Platini, Cruyff or Marco Van Basten. But four? Five? Impossible.

"In the future, everything will be more equal amongst the best players. Though now they try to sell the story of the battle between Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, those of us who know football, know there is no comparison."

"When Messi ends his career, there will be Neymar, Eden Hazard and five or 10 players at a similar level, but none with the unquestionable superiority of Messi."
Xavi speaking to Sport in 2016

Consistency is the wrong word for Ronaldo and Messi. Consistency puts into the mind an idea of a player who can be merely relied upon to perform for a long time. A diesel wagon. There isn’t a word big enough to describe the extra-terrestrial efforts they have put in over the past decade or so.

What they are doing cannot be seen as the new standard. There is not a man alive who can touch either of them. When all is said and done and Ronaldo’s back in Portugal and Messi in Argentina, we will have to readjust our expectations of what it means to be a great player.

No one will ever thrill us like they can. We will be cheering for players we know are not good enough to lace their boots. That is the saddest thing. One day we’ll wake up and this dream will be over. The records will be forever untouched and so too will our sense of wonder.

It isn’t enough to say Ronaldo and Messi have improved football. They have changed it. This isn’t like Arsene Wenger teaching English players to eat properly and look after themselves. Eventually, everyone can do that and catch up. It’s not like Pep Guardiola and his sweeping tactical changes.

Eventually, too, ideas become redundant and things change. Messi and Ronaldo – they’re so far ahead of anything that’s gone before and impossible to match for anyone coming after.

those two guys are just too good, it may take a very long time before we see players that will break the records these guys has set.
I think this is worth frontpage

Ronaldo and Messi
I'm jst happy they're playing in d same era,one would have make us think he's better than the other if they happens to be playing in different eras...
messi fans don't see dem equal tho,bkos messi dribbles till date,they think they've seen it all...
forgetting that if personal qualities are to be reviewed,ronaldo flaws messi..
I stopped comparing them since two yrs ago tho,kos it's always an unending contest.
I jst enjoy them play,thats all

Imagine we had only one of them,he would have won 9 balon d or in all the way

Oluwaremythe:
Ronaldo and Messi
I'm jst happy they're playing in d same era,one would have make us think he's better than the other if they happens to be playing in different eras...
messi fans don't see dem equal tho,bkos messi dribbles till date,they think they've seen it all...
forgetting that if personal qualities are to be reviewed,ronaldo flaws messi..
I stopped comparing them since two yrs ago tho,kos it's always an unending contest.
I jst enjoy them play,thats all

messi completes dribbles more, passes better, control better, assist more, better free kick takerm cr7 has better goal scoring record, good header of d ball, use both feet better. Age wise + awards, Messi still better.

Frankaka8:
messi completes dribbles more, passes better, control better, assist more, better free kick takerm cr7 has better goal scoring record, good header of d ball, use both feet better. Age wise + awards, Messi still better.

yu talk like a clown,ion av enough data to argue,bt know dis
best header of the ball,better goal scoring records,better free kick taker,best chances conversion...ronaldo leads messi in all
yu can argue all yu like bt I jst told yu d fact.take it or deal with ur skull.thank yu

Una Don Start Abi

Ronaldo isn't close to messi in fk in recent years....messi has to miss 100+ freekicks to be par with ronaldos freekicks par gol.....ronaldo had more shots Dan almost all of Dan messi and suarezcomebined despite playing less games ..BT way less gols and u say is conversion rate was better .....? In UCL group stage India season messi took only 14 shots and 10 of those were gols.ronaldo is d greatest goal poacher I have seen though ....BT not d best player for me .BT his goal records are breathtaking ....DAT take away from him and his just some below average player like deolefeu cos him man de play d same way

Oluwaremythe:

yu talk like a clown,ion av enough data to argue,bt know dis
best header of the ball,better goal scoring records,better free kick taker,best chances conversion...ronaldo leads messi in all
yu can argue all yu like bt I jst told yu d fact.take it or deal with ur skull.thank yu

Rapahel1116:
Ronaldo isn't close to messi in fk in recent years....messi has to miss 100+ freekicks to be par with ronaldos freekicks par gol.....ronaldo had more shots Dan almost all of Dan messi and suarezcomebined despite playing less games ..BT way less gols and u say is conversion rate was better .....? In UCL group stage India season messi took only 14 shots and 10 of those were gols.ronaldo is d greatest goal poacher I have seen though ....BT not d best player for me .BT his goal records are breathtaking ....DAT take away from him and his just some below average player like deolefeu cos him man de play d same way

you dnt nid to tell us d good things Ronaldo possesses ok,kos reading ur end statements,it's clear yu are one of his haterz...
now bck to ur last statements,taking away messi's sharp cutting dribbles from him,he's clearly jst gon be one of dos average players like mahrez,griezman and d likes too...

Oluwaremythe:

yu talk like a clown,ion av enough data to argue,bt know dis
best header of the ball,better goal scoring records,better free kick taker,best chances conversion...ronaldo leads messi in all
yu can argue all yu like bt I jst told yu d fact.take it or deal with ur skull.thank yu

sorry sir, goal ratio Messi is better. Messi is a playmaker + goal scorer, cr7 is only a goal scorer. Messi shoots less and score more, cr7 shoots more, and score more.

Frankaka8:
sorry sir, goal ratio Messi is better. Messi is a playmaker + goal scorer, cr7 is only a goal scorer. Messi shoots less and score more, cr7 shoots more, and score more.

Y u carry this thing on top head like cucumber??
Messi n Rinaldo don't know who ur broke ASS is!
Hustle n write ur own destiny biko!!!

Frankaka8:
messi completes dribbles more, passes better, control better, assist more, better free kick takerm cr7 has better goal scoring record, good header of d ball, use both feet better. Age wise + awards, Messi still better.

You better do ur analysis properly, who told u Messi is better than cr7 in free kick taking. Cr7 is number 3 best free kick taker in the world while Messi is no where to be found.

luminouz:

Y u carry this thing on top head like cucumber??
Messi n Rinaldo don't know who ur broke ASS is!
Hustle n write ur own destiny biko!!!

you resort to names and insults, i cannot stoop so low for such. Have a nice life.

Tcode:

You better do ur analysis properly, who told u Messi is better than cr7 in free kick taking. Cr7 is number 3 best free kick taker in the world while Messi is no where to be found.

don't forget cr7 started playing football before messi, cr7 has 47 free kicks, to messi 28. Buh messi has 8% conversion ration to cr7 6.5%. And Messi free kick rating is higher as well.




https://www.quora.com/Who-has-scored-more-goals-via-free-kick-Messi-or-Ronaldo