The world of soccer is full of great stars from everywhere. But when you mention the names Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo everyone has to step aside. These two figures have fought the title of best player for several years now and the race gets tougher as years go by. The question is: What criterium are we using to define who is better?

There is no doubt that both players have great skills, technical ability and the talent to change a match with one play. But is this enough? Have they won something so important that they can be catalogued as the best players in the world? Let’s take a look at their careers to see what we find.

Cristiano Ronaldo (CR7).

This great player is from Portugal and he is 27 years old. He became popular as a professional in Manchester United, where he played for almost 6 years (2003 to 2009). During this period, he won the UEFA Champions League with the English team and was awarded with several prizes (the golden ball, best player, etc.) He also helped ManU to achieve the Premier League Title in 2007.

His career has been full of triumphs and awards, first in Manchester and now in Real Madrid. He has been awarded the European Golden Shoe, he was the Fan’s Best Player in the Champions Leauge Final against Chelsea and has had some great games with his latest team. As a National Player he has helped Portugal to become a better team and has had great performances whenever he is summoned.

Lionel Messi.

This young kid has won everything. As most of you know, Barcelona talent scouts saw his potential when he was little and they recruited him for the Spanish youth team. Once in Europe, he was given treatment for an hormonal disorder which wasn’t letting him grow. Since his debut in the major team, he has been awarded with an astonishing amount of prizes.

He has helped Barcelona to win the Spanish League five times, he has been the champion of the UEFA Champions League three times as well as several King’s Cups. At his young age (only 24), he has entered the history of Professional Soccer for winning Golden Shoes and Ballon d’Ors consecutively (only players like Michel Platini, Johan Cruyff and Marco van Basten had done this) and he still has a long career to go.

When we see at the career record of these two players, we can do nothing but admire everything they have achieved. However, both of them have found a lot of trouble when it comes to one subject: their National teams.

Portugal has never really been a top competitor at international tournaments (European Cups and World Cups), and when you take part in these competitions you need to have a great team not just a couple of good players.

On the other hand, Argentina has a great history of victories and glorious moments. Therefore, every time they step on the field, people is expecting nothing but championships from them. This kind of pressure has been a problem recently because they haven’t been able to achieve good performances in international competitions.

The worst thing is that everyone thinks that Messi should be doing something more to change Argentina’s current situation and, let’s face it, although he might be one of the greatest players in history, he can’t do everything alone.

What has helped him to be a great player in Barcelona is that he has great teammates and that they have a great tactic scheme. The problem is that the National team has had some bad coaches in the past who thought that only because they had great players, they wouldn’t need a good strategy. Wrong!

So for now, we will leave this discussion open. I think that Lionel Messi will be remembered many years from now as the phenomenon he really is, and that Cristiano Ronaldo is a great player but doesn’t have what it takes to take the responsibility of being Portugal’s leader. However, I would like to see who has the first great achievement with their National Teams because that’s all these players need to become historic.