Who is Better? Messi or Ronaldo

   People keep debating about who’s better, Messi or Ronaldo. I decided to interview some people at Hueneme High School to see their opinion on who’s better. 

I interviewed HHS freshman, Jacob Ramirez and asked him some questions on who he thought was better.  He stated that “Ronaldo is better because he scored more goals and has a better international team than Messi.” Jacob is correct when he says that Ronaldo has scored more goals, but Argentina is better than Portugal because they have won more trophies than Portugal. Jacob continued saying, “Messi started with a good club, while Ronaldo worked hard to join a good team. Messi is talent and Ronaldo is hard work.” Messi was in Barcelona when he was young, while Ronaldo was in Sporting (i.e. an elite international soccer club). Messi had more offers to elite clubs, while Ronaldo had far fewer offers and had to work harder to get to Messi’s level.

I then interviewed HHS freshman, Ulysses Herrera. Ulysses stated that “I think Messi is better. He has accomplished more and has more trophies.” While this is true, Messi also won the Ballon d’Or more times than Ronaldo. this an award where the best player wins once a year. Messi has been awarded 7 times while Ronaldo has been awarded only 5 times.

My final interview was conducted with HHS freshman, Eduardo Manzano. Eduardo stated that “Messi is better because he has a higher combined G/A average (i.e. goals and assists) than Ronaldo, plus Messi has better stats.” Messi does have more assists than Ronaldo. He also has better stats and his goals and assists combined are higher than Ronaldo’s. Eduardo continued on, saying, “They both have different play styles. One of them plays as a striker (viz.Ronaldo). The other one plays as a right winger (viz. Messi).” A striker’s job is to score goals and a right winger is supposed to assist the striker or score if he misses.

In my opinion, Ronaldo is better, but that probably goes for anyone who supports him. There are however, many people who think Messi is better. This whole debate is based on two things: statistics and who the fan likes more. Unfortunately, there are many fans on either side that bring up events in the players’ personal lives in order to argue that the other player is better. For example, Messi fans often say that say that Ronaldo’s wife is a gold digger. Or Ronaldo fans often say that Messi’s kids still aren’t even on a soccer team yet, unlike Ronaldo’s kids who are. Even though their fans debate a lot on who’s better, Messi and Ronaldo are actually friends. Ironically, it’s the fans that feel aggression towards each other. 

Some fans are pretty careless about the debate because they bring in negative things about the players’ personal lives to prove a point. Despite these fans, I still enjoy the debate. It’s fun to research because it’s fascinating to see Messi and Ronaldo’s childhood and see how they got to where they are right now. I’ll still stay loyal to Ronaldo because he inspires me to work hard towards my dream of one day going pro.