What determines greatness in football? The number of goals, assists, dribbles, wins, cups? These are all stats. The world has some amazing players who have crazy data. In recent years, both Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo showed unprecedented statistics. Nevertheless, I don’t feel data tells everything. Data fails to capture the joy or excitement. If we lean purely on data, the game wouldn’t be as good. We need that spark. The Brazilian Ronaldo had it all.
My measurement to greatness is whether fans would watch a game just because of that very footballer and nothing else. There’s still something beyond that. It’s that magic! You would not only watch the game but also expect something spectacular, something extraordinary, something you haven’t seen before. And, Ronaldo did it time after time. When you think about things he did on the pitch, I sometimes wonder how do you even think about such things. It’s really surreal. Perhaps, this is football romanticism. Nevertheless, there are players and coaches who agree with me.
Ronaldo is the best player I ever played with. He had such ease with the ball. He is number one. Every day I trained with him, I saw something different, something new, something beautiful. That’s what makes the difference between a very good player, and the exception, who, for me, is Ronaldo
Zinedine Zidane
The best player I have ever played with? That’s Ronaldo, il Fenomeno. I have seen il Fenomeno do things that nobody else has ever done.
Kaka
For me, Ronaldo is the greatest. There was nobody like him. No one has influenced both football and the players who emerged as Ronaldo.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic
We can go on with other quotes but other comments would be more or like the same. Ronaldo turned magic into reality. He had different imagination. That imagination became real on the pitch. That’s what makes him different than anyone else. Apart from this magic, he also had a lethal combination of skills. He was fast, agile, strong, and precise. Many other players have such attributes but he combined all of them at the same time. He was precise while being fast. He was agile while being strong.
El fenomeno can’t be described by data. Data fails to show his greatness. Although he still has amazing performances, those magical moments in the game get unnoticed when we only rely on data. One might call this romanticism. It’s okay. This is a personal opinion but I know many who hold the same.