Messi Or Ronaldo?

With the domestic season over, the next couple of weeks are bound to be the most dragged out and downright boring in the entire year. And, as RVP’s future isn't getting any clearer, I’d much rather talk about other things, for example, the age-old debate between whether Leo or Cristiano is better at football. This was suggested to me by my good friend Sepehr, who, although he’s a United fan, he definitely knows his football. Hopefully this argument can finally be put to rest – there’s only one winner in my mind…

It’s easy to assume that the ‘better’ player out of the two can be decided by Ballon D’ors, Golden Boots or comparisons to Maradona, yet that doesn’t separate one gifted player from another. Let’s face it; if everything was decided on trophies, Arsenal would be somewhere in League One by now, United and Barcelona would have won countless amounts of silverware and Messi himself would have had to build a warehouse to keep all his awards in one building. Unfortunately for Messi, only the best teams win things, not the best players.

Sure, Barca have won everything there is to win in the last few years and Messi has been a central part of their success. But would Barca have won those without him? Of course they would. Anyone who watches Barca knows that everything goes through Xavi and/or Iniesta in every move, and Messi finishes them off. Obviously, with Messi being a genius, he is able to score goals in the most sublime fashion possible, and can go past players with ease and at will, but again, you don’t need to do that to score, do you? The thing with Messi and indeed Barcelona is it’s all about style over substance. It works against most teams but sometimes – like this year – teams come well prepared to deal with that style.

The style and exuberance that Xavi and Iniesta create game after game for Barcelona is what separates them from other sides – there are few if any sides can rival that quality in midfield, yet many sides can compete with the finishing strengths of Messi, if not the super skills that come with it. The question is will an on-fire Messi be as effective without supply from Xavi and Iniesta? Probably not. Put him in the Premier League and Aguero will out-score him easily. The harsh truth is that Messi is a very skilful player who can score goals, nothing more. A very effective player and truly deserving of his accolades but a large part of his success comes courtesy of his teammates.

I’m sure many will disagree with that, but you wouldn’t put Messi anywhere on the pitch for that precise reason – leave him playing to his strengths. He was playing slightly deep for a few minutes against Chelsea and bam – gives the ball away and Chelsea score. Maybe he should just stick to playing in and around the area from now on.

Now take someone who has already proved his worth in the Premier League and then ripped La Liga to shreds. He may have only just won his first title, but most of that is down to the brilliance of Barcelona. Despite this, he has outshone every single one of his teammates. In many ways, he has carried that team forward single-handedly, with a little help from Mourinho, of course. Ronaldo doesn’t care how he scores, because he can score any way possible; Free-kicks, tap-ins, long-range rockets, you name it. He can do it all.

Most crucially, he can do it by himself. United would never have won 3 Premier League with such little difficulty without his input. This is also not forgetting he is primarily a midfielder – making his scoring records all the more ridiculous to believe. He could probably go into any team in the world and win them the title. He has more goals than games, for goodness’ sake. Is there really much point in arguing? Real Madrid and Man. United both had great players alongside him but the trophy haul would never have been as great because Ronaldo is a team player, even though he can be unnecessarily cocky at times.

I could go on, but just so that it's clear: Messi may be better at scoring goals, passing, chipping the ‘keeper and annoyingly, lifting trophies, but Ronaldo is better at playing football. End of story.