The eternal Cristiano Ronaldo plays in Saudi Arabia, his rival Lionel Messi in the USA. The two superstars have shaped world football since the 2006 World Cup. They took football into a different time. Now everything is over, announces the Portuguese.
In these last days of summer 2023, Al-Nassr’s jerseys shine particularly beautifully. They are still a fad, but the club from the Saudi Pro League has made it to the last corners of the German provinces. Not because the club is so good, but because probably the greatest footballer of the past few decades is under contract there. At least for those who didn’t believe in the Argentine Lionel Messi, but in the Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo.
The dualism of the two superstars has dominated the world of football for an even longer period of time than FC Bayern Munich dominated the Bundesliga. Since deep in the 00s, since the summer fairy tale of 2006, the question “Messi or Ronaldo?” above everything. She was one who reminded the very old observers of the fundamental question “Rolling Stones or Beatles?” and which in the world of round leather was perhaps only comparable to the 1970s. Back when Johan Cruyff perfected the game, Pelé was still active and Franz Beckenbauer invented a new position.
However, those were different times. The world accelerator Internet, the digitalization of gaming on consoles and social media increased dualism to previously unimagined heights. The fans unconditionally followed the stars in their increasingly hectic career moves to the next club. At the 2022 World Cup, a real Ronaldomania swept through the desert state. They stood in front of the stadiums in CR7 jerseys and posed for the “Siuuuuuuu” cheer. When they arrived at the stadium, it didn’t matter to them whether Ronaldo was playing or not. They celebrated him anyway. Because they knew him from the clips on YouTube and loved what they thought he stood for – eternal success – so much about him.
2023 – the year of escape from Europe
Ronaldo was eliminated from the World Cup, Messi won it. He crowned himself with a remarkable tournament in which he had ten players around him, all of whom trusted him and all of whom had one goal in common. Ronaldo went to Saudi Arabia, Messi visited him with his club Paris Saint-Germain immediately afterwards and then he preferred to go to Miami in the summer. The Saudis had also hoped, but the USA was also trying to get him.
The fans followed them even when they left Europe, the very continent where both won the majority of their nearly 80 trophies and both scored the majority of their 800-plus goals. They left a Europe that was not always well-disposed towards them after the “Football Leaks” publications. They also left a Europe in which they had not been happy in recent years. Ronaldo not since his move from Real Madrid to Juventus and Messi not since his departure from FC Barcelona. It was “hell” for him there, as the superstar Neymar, who was unable to play, explained just this week. Unless a miracle happens, the two will never face each other in a competitive game again.
Lionel Messi, wrapped in a so-called bishop, presents the World Cup trophy.
(Photo: picture alliance / DeFodi Images)
“The rivalry is over,” announced This week Cristiano Ronaldo was also in the Portuguese national team camp. “It was good. The audience liked it.” Then he asked for reconciliation. “Those who like Cristiano Ronaldo do not have to hate Messi and vice versa.” They would have always respected each other anyway; Even if they never became friends in their decades together, they still achieved something together. “We did really well. We changed the history of football.”
The Haaland generation is taking over
But this story has now been told. For the first time in 20 years, Ronaldo is not nominated for the Ballon d’Or, the best footballer of the past season. Lionel Messi has done it again and maybe he will even get another chance. But then it’s over for him too. You don’t need to be trained as a clairvoyant.
The changing of the guard can no longer be stopped. A new generation is taking over and has long since been revered. This isn’t just the case in football. It is the passage of time that can currently also be observed in tennis. For example with the still growing Spanish tennis giant Carlo Alcaraz. The 20-year-old is the leader of the new generation of superstars. There is no longer any doubt about that. The old heroes are on their last legs: Roger Federer has already left the stage and Rafael Nadal will soon follow him. He hopes for one last hello on the court, but time is running out. So only Novak Djokovic remains, who recently looked back sentimentally at the US Open. Alcaraz doesn’t have time for that yet.
Can Musiala keep his promise?
“I’m sure he’ll be the best player in the world in this position. I’m really, really happy to have him in the team,” Alcaraz recently said about former Dortmund player Jude Bellingham. He is now a superstar at Real Madrid, the tennis shooting star’s absolute heart club, and is therefore one of the next leaders in football. But it’s not that far yet. The Englishman has already been nominated for the Ballon d’Or this year, but he is not a promising candidate. The chances are completely different for Erling Haaland, a Norwegian elemental force who once learned to run with Bellingham in Dortmund, but not necessarily how to win.
Now the Bellingham celebration follows, like Carlos Alcaraz here. Ronaldo is history.
(Photo: IMAGO/USA TODAY Network)
Bellingham, Haaland and Kylian Mbappé, perhaps even Munich’s Jamal Musiala: They are all still at the beginning of a long career. When Haaland, now 23 years old, reaches Ronaldo’s current age in 2038, the Portuguese will be long over 50 years old. He will be a memory, just like Lionel Messi, who will always be pictured raising the World Cup into the desert evening sky in the golden stadium of Lusail.
“Our legacy will live on”
The children in the German provinces will then wear the Bellingham and Haaland jerseys. No matter which clubs and on which continent they will play. Nobody can currently imagine the football world at the end of the 2030s. Football has once again reached a turning point. This has been shown not least by this wild transfer summer with the sudden and, for many, at least disturbing emergence of Saudi Arabia as a global player.
But the game will survive in some form. It’s too strong for the attacks. And so, at the end of the 2030s, the fans will adore the World Cup record goalscorer Mbappé and hopefully also be happy about the fulfilled promise of the midfielder Musiala. In tennis, Alcaraz will probably have long since replaced Djokovic as the record holder with the most Grand Slam victories.
The rivalry between Ronaldo and Messi will have been one of the foundation stones for everything that is to come in football. Both changed football forever. Both left Europe before the end of their careers, thereby leaving the door wide open for other continents. The football world no longer only looks at Europe and it certainly no longer only looks at Ronaldo and Messi. “Our legacy will live on,” says Ronaldo and a child with an Al-Nassr jersey rides past on a bicycle.