Cristiano Ronaldo: World's Best
Is the Manchester United Star the Greatest Player in the World?
Cristiano Ronaldo could go one better this campaign than last, and win Fifa World Player of the Year, but is he really the world's finest footballer?
He was second only to AC Milan's Kaka for last year's Fifa World Player of the Year, but he is the frontrunner for the title in 2008. Cristiano Ronaldo has scored 38 goals for Manchester United this season, an astonishing number for a winger, smashing the 40 year old record of 35 strikes held by George Best. Ronaldo is arguably having the greatest single season of any player in the history of Manchester United.
The Liverpool striker Fernando Torres has suggested that Manchester United are overly reliant on their Portuguese playmaker, claiming that Ronaldo "has carried United on his back" through the season, as reported by Charlie Caroe, April 18 for the Telegraph. Although Ronaldo is United's outstanding player, it is the team around him that allows him to play his game. To suggest that he carries United is off the mark.
Match-Winners Throughout the Team
It is United's rock-solid defence, which has kept over twenty clean sheets in the premier league this season that allows the attacking players to move forward, in the knowledge that they are not vulnerable at the back. Ronaldo has scored over a third of United's goals this season, but we have also often seen match-winning displays from Carlos Tevez and Wayne Rooney, who have 17 goals apiece this campaign. Tevez has the uncanny ability to score goals at crucial times for his team, such as his strike against Lyon in the February away leg in the Champions League, which gave the Red Devils a priceless away goal.
Michael Carrick's already impressive passing game seems to improve with every match, which allows him often to dictate the flow of United's play. Although Paul Scholes has come in for criticism recently, the former England player has shown that he can still run the game from the hole, and in Owen Hargreaves United have a true ball-winner, who against Arsenal at Old Trafford showed that along with Ronaldo, Sir Alex Ferguson looks to have another dead ball specialist.
Lionel Messi
Barcelona's inspirational Argentine, Lionel Messi is currently perhaps the only player who deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as United's Ronaldo. Kaka and Ronaldinho have both been injured for long spells this season. Although we have seen moments of their brilliance when they have played, both players have failed to produce the type of consistent form which has seen them named Fifa World Player of the Year in previous seasons.
Messi the boy wonder dazzles for Barcelona. He is as important to the Blaugrana as Ronaldo is to United. He has 15 goals in 33 appearances this season, although the player has only recently returned from an injury sustained in March. Messi can turn a game in Barca's favour. He scored perhaps one of the finest goals in football history against Getafe in the Copa Del Rey this season. Receiving the ball on the half-way line, the Argentine weaved past five players and the goalkeeper to score. His return for the Champions League semi-final clash against Manchester United could well define Barcelona's season. In the Champions League he has six goals in seven games this season, second only to Cristiano Ronaldo, who has seven.
Last season's European clash between Manchester United and AC Milan was as much a battle between the Red Devils' Ronaldo and Milan's Kaka. Many pundits agree that Kaka's match-winning displays, which sent Milan through, are what elevated him above Ronaldo to be named the 2007 Fifa World Player of the Year. Kaka single-handedly destroyed Manchester United at the San Siro. The Barca-United tie could also decide, for many, who is judged to be the better player between Ronaldo and Messi.
Cristiano Ronaldo
Ronaldo is playing football on a level so far removed from any other player in world football. What makes him so good? The Portuguese can score from anywhere, he can play with his right or left foot, allowing him to cut in to the box, or keep to the line, a nightmare for a defender. This is perhaps why he is the fourth most fouled player in the league in the 2007/08 season, as reported by the Telegraph on March 20. It is a rare occasion to see him lose possession. His ball control while running at speed is remarkable and crucially, he has the end product to his game that was lacking only a few seasons ago. Ronaldo is a player capable of taking the match by the scruff of the neck, of galvanising his team simply by playing his game.
Paul Scholes has said that the Portuguese player is the greatest footballer he has ever played with, referring to his goal haul as "nothing short of amazing". That is high praise indeed, considering the calibre of Eric Cantona, Roy Keane, David Beckham and Ryan Giggs to name but a few United players Scholes has worked with. On this season's form, as good as Messi is, quite simply, Ronaldo is better.
