Mate James and Morata left the club a year ago what are you on about?
Yeah sure they've got big names but have you seen them play in the league? They have been shite. Ronaldo has dragged them this season. Wouldnt have been anywhere near the CL if it wasn't for Ronaldo
Excactly, they left only a year ago, they were also part of all this briht Madrid era. In fact they were here the last season when Madrid won 5 of the 6 tournaments they played. But still some people here try to say its all thanks to Ronaldo. Hahaha.
450 is a nice number to end it on. Won't be an easy record to be broken.
@Cezzine you vastly underrate what Ronaldo is if you think it's the players around him that are making him look as good as he does. You talk about the service he gets from Marcelo, Modric, Benzema, etc. but just wait and watch the service he'll get from Pjanic, Douglas Costa, Dybala..
With Ronaldo it's always been the same, he wouldn't look good without Rooney alongside him, then he wouldn't look good without Ozil or Di Maria and now he won't look good without Marcelo and Modric. If you think it's impossible for him to keep scoring once a game then I think you'll be shocked.
He'll end his career with more goals for his country than anyone in football history... while playing for Portugal. He makes the service look better than it is and you'll see it next season when Marcelo, Kroos and Lucas Vasquez get into crossing positions and there will be noone to aim at or noone dragging 2 or 3 defenders away. Madrid have enough money and quality to still be at the top but you vastly underrate Ronaldo's influence on the way this Madrid team works. Plenty will have to change, you won't just get a good striker and play the same way. That won't work.
Its not underrating him saying that. You only have to compare his numbers with Madrid and with Portugal. Even if you compare his numbers when he was in one of the best Manchester Utd teams in history, his best season numbers are similar if not worse to this last season numbers where he disappeared frm August to February. So yes, playing in this team makes you look better as Messi looks mich better with Barca than in Argentina.
And man, you can't be serious comparing Douglas Costa, Dybala and Pjanic with Modric, Kross, Marcelo, Isco, etc, right?
Ah yes, so Ronaldo consistently clutching it in the knockout stages of the CL year in year out is nothing to do with him.. I especially liked that wonderful assist from Carvajal in the quarter final against Juve, all Ronaldo had to do is fall over backwards and it went in.. Messi has a great team around him and they've struggled to get past the QF 3 years in a row now. Pre-Ronaldo your all mighty Real failed to get past the R16 stage 5 years in a row.
Good luck leading the line with Benzema up front.. or with Kane. As good as he is, he doesn't hold a candle to Ronaldo. Good finishing, hold up play, but nowhere near the same dribbling, athleticism or movement as Ronaldo. You'll see that once you get him.
You can't simply buy the Ronaldo's, Bale's of this world anymore either - PSG can beat you easily financially as they have for Neymar and Mbappe, and City, Barca, United and probably even Liverpool can match you financially for other players. You think it's a coincidence that players like Morata and James have left and you've barely signed any replacements? You think it's a coincidence Zidane's jumped ship if he didn't think the team was coming to the end of its cycle?
Look, I get it, when players want to leave, it leaves a bitter taste and you tend to want to downplay that players achievements. We had that with Rooney wanting to leave around 2010. But you are talking about a player who's consistently ranked as one of the best of all time.. to downplay his achievements so much is incredible. He didn't become great at Real, he was great at United and won the CL, 3 leagues and the Ballon D'or by the time he was 23. After he left, in the next 4 years we won the league twice and finished level on points (lost to GD) and 1 point behind the other two times. Pretty easily he could've won at least say 3 out of those 4 leagues with us had he stayed, instead he left to play at a poor Madrid team in 09 that regularly fielded players like Granero, Garay, Albiol and Guti. He actively pushed for that transfer, and yet he gets little love at Madrid.
The simple reality is that you remove Ronaldo from that Real team and they don't win anywhere close to 3 CL's in the last 3 years (a combined total of 43 CL goals in those 3 seasons!), whereas most other players in that team you could replace reasonably easily with subs. You'll learn that once he leaves.
NO. Real Madrid still were KOd in th R16 in Ronaldo's first sason there. Madrid started to get into finals since Mourinho took the team and changed their mentallity. And getting not only Ronaldo, but also Benzema, Di Maria, Ozil, Alonso, Carvajal, Modric, Khedira, etc helps right?
So let's be realistic. You say that without Ronaldo Madrid wouldn't have won the UCL so often this years. Yes, it is true, as it is with some other players like Ramos.
Without Ramos two goals vs Bayern in semifinals and his goal at the 93th minute in the final (a game that Ronaldo totally disappeared, as in 3 of the 4 UCL finals Madrid has won recently...) Madrid wouldn't had won it, and maybe not the next ones.
Or la Liga in 2017 that Madrid won (1 of the 2 that Ronaldo has won in this last 9 years) Ramos 5 goals in the last 10 minutes of tied games traduced in 15 points for Madrid literally.
And what about Modric? Without Modric Ronaldo won 1 Liga and 1 Copa del Rey in 4 seasons. Since Modric is a starter in Madrid, they have won 4 UCLs in 5 years. Same with Bale and he has scored in the 2 UCl finals he has started, and in the Cup Final he started just the same. So is clear its not thanks to Ronaldo only.
Ronaldo IS NOT the one that wanted to leave Madrid, his family is happy there knows there is no other team in the world he can be winning the Ballon D'or every year. Madrid is the one that didn't waed to pay him as much as Messi or Neymar win, and also Florentino is the one that told him that if he brings an offer of 100M Euros, he can leave despite having contract till 2021 and a 1000M release clause. I think that speaks a lot about Madrid wanting him to stay.
Madrid still can get any player they want if they really want him. With Mbappe its not that he preffered PSG and Madrid couldn't do anything to stop that. Madrid offered him a place in the bench because of his age and he would have to fight for a place in the starting 11 vs Benzema and Bale (starters) and Isco, Asensio and Vazquez in the bench. In PSG he would get there as a superstar, with superstar wages and would play all the games as a starter.
If Madrid offered him a place as a starter and pay him as that and not as a bench player, he would have gone to Madrid.
In the same manner, let's compare what you win in the next few years, compared to with Ronaldo...
Of course we will, be sure of that...
Overall you make some good points, but you overplay the strength of the squad tremendously. Real Madrid have won 2 league titles in 9 years, so they're definitely second tier to Barcelona.
Yes, Madrid have won a lot of CL's, but quite frankly some of those were ill-deserved. You won one against AM by drawing in the last minute, and won another on PK's- then the shameful refereeing vs Bayern etc, yes the team have been successful, but it's not been Sacchi's Milan or Pep's Barca. This cycle is over, it might be awhile before RM wins in Europe again.
You have a coach that emphasizes Spanish players, will see how successful he will be in Europe. If you think Vasquez and Isco and Asensio will bail you out, well we've seen how good Spain have been recently.
Are you seriously thinking of replacing Ronaldo with Kane? I mean, go for it, but it would be a huge step down.
I wholeheartedly agree that none is bigger than the club tho, so I see why Flo is telling Ronnie to go away.
Winning 2 Ligas in 9 years doesn't makes you a worse team that Barca wehn you have won 4 UCLs in that hears vs Barca's 2. It only shows that Barca can be more consistent along the season while Madrid gets overconfident and ties or loses games vs small teams.
Where you really show how good you can be is in the UCL, playing vs the ebst teams in the world, in 2 game knockout tiew where you have to play your best to win.
All 4 Real Madrid UCLs of the recent years are totally deserved.
AM last minute draw was totally deserved, ATM scored because Casillas had a brainfart and then Madrid destroed them all the game, while Courtois was the best player of the game, but it seems to me that you didn't even watched that match or you would have known that.
Then you talk about the shameful referee vs Bayern, really? The Bayern myth made by the people that hate Madrid... in the first leg of that game, the referee awarded Bayern a penalty that clearly wasn't. In the 2nd game the referee had to red card Vidal since the 2nd minute lf the game, and then again when the 2nd time started (you can see the highlights lf that game in youtube), he played for free all that game but antiMadrid guys only say that Casemiro should be also red carded just before the extra time where Ronald scored the offside goal.
Then you remember that the extra time was only played thanks to the referee, because the Bayern goal that tied the game, was a clear Lewandowski offside. But then again you don't talk about that right? With the VAR, that game would never had hot tonthe extra time...
Madrid in all that UCLs sent out 3 times ATL after they sent out Barca. They also sent out twisce Juve just before they also sent put Barca. And they sent out Bayern 3 times, in twice of them they scored them 5 goals...