Football (or soccer) is still the most popular sport in the world. It has hundreds of millions of fans worldwide and it’s played in every corner of the globe. Throughout a century and a half of this sport, there have been many players who established themselves as some of the best footballers ever.
Nevertheless, two of today’s biggest stars, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, are already considered one of the greatest players in history, even though their careers are far from over.
Betting Sites did an interesting comparison between the two players, and it’s definitely worth taking a look at. However, we won’t focus too much on how Messi and Ronaldo fare against each other, but more on how they measure against other football legends.
Older fans got to watch the likes of Pele and Maradona. Even though these two didn’t play in the same generation, the question of who of them is greater still remains. Both Pele and Maradona won the FIFA World Cup multiple times and won numerous other trophies playing for their clubs.
Watching Pele’s clips today might leave you wondering what was so impressive about his game. However, you have to take into consideration that he played over half a century ago and, at that time, what he was doing was out of this world.
For a long time, Pele was the undisputed king of football history until Maradona stepped into the scene and astonished the world. His dribbling and goal scoring skills propelled him to a status of a legend in Argentina and beyond.
If you would ask an Argentinian, he or she would probably tell you that Maradona was better than Messi, largely because Messi didn’t manage to win any trophies with his national team. While this might be true, team success is not a perfect criterion when talking about the quality of an individual player.
Ronaldo didn’t win a World Cup either, but that’s because Portugal is a small country with not that much room for talent.
Individually speaking, Messi and Ronaldo each won five titles for the best footballer of the year (Ballon d’Or), more than any other player. To be fair, this title is awarded only since 1991, and Pele, Maradona, Platini, Best, Di Stéfano and other legends would have won several of them for sure if they had the chance.
Out of all the players in the last 20 years, only Zidane and Ronaldo (the Brazilian one) can be compared to these two. There were plenty of others that had strong outbursts of football brilliance like Ronaldinho, Kaka, Rivaldo, Baggio, Figo, and others, but they weren’t as good as as Messi and Ronaldo were (and still are).
It’s hard comparing players from different generations, but Messi and Ronaldo seem to be on the good way to leave everyone else in the dust. They have a strong case already, and when you take into account that they’re still playing on the highest level, they will most likely be remembered as the two greatest players of all time.