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The media perception is that Messi is unreliable from the spot, whereas Ronaldo is the ultimate ice-cool penalty king - the truth, is somewhere in between.Įxcluding shootouts, Ronaldo has scored an impressive 143 penalties (with 28 misses) over his whole career, whereas Messi has scored 102 penalties (with 29 misses). When it comes to penalties, Ronaldo's numbers are comfortably superior to Messi's, although perhaps not by as much as some people think. There is therefore little doubt that Lionel Messi is the best when it comes to dribbling. As a result Messi comes much deeper, towards the play, rather than making runs and playing off the shoulder of the defenders.īecause he often comes deep to receive the ball, dribbling is still a major part of Messi's game, completing an incredible 2914 dribbles in the league and Champions League, compared to Ronaldo's 1631 successful dribbles (since 2003/04). However, Messi plays a very different game to a traditional centre-forward, with his natural Number 10 abilities making him the perfect False 9. Messi also started his footballing career stuck to the by-line, eventually moving to a more central role as his primary position for most of his career. As he has transitioned to an inside-forward / striker role over the years, dribbling has naturally become significantly less of a factor in Ronaldo's performances. Ronaldo started his career as a tricky winger, when his game was all about running at and beating defenders with his pace and skill. Of all the categories, goalscoring is the hardest to separate them on. If we take these differing beginnings into account, the ratios would be even closer. For Messi, it was 2-3 years until he completed the transformation from a nippy winger into a player hungry for goals above everything else. Ronaldo still has more all time career goals than Messi though (Ronaldo has 803 career goals and Messi has 758 career goals), but Ronaldo has played 148 more games over his career than Messi has.Īlthough Messi shades the overll ratio, Ronaldo spent more of his formative years as a more traditional right winger, only really starting to focus on goalscoring as his primary function in 2006, 3-4 years into his career. If we drill down into goals per minutes, Messi scores a goal every 103 minutes, and Ronaldo scores a goal every 111 minutes. Over their entire careers, it's Messi who edges the ratio, with 0.80 goals per game, whereas Ronaldo has scored 0.73 goals per game. The adjacency of their goalscoring - matching each other blow for blow - has been astounding over the years. During the 9 years Ronaldo spent at Real Madrid, Messi and Ronaldo both scored a goal every 85 minutes in all competitions. What really made this rivalry catch fire was their incredible, unprecedented goalscoring rates, with both Messi and Ronaldo averaging more than one goal every game at their peaks.