Last Saturday, Antonio Cassano ignited controversy in Italian football with explosive statements. “I think he has failed,” the former footballer commented on Cristiano Ronaldo’s performance at Juventus.
According to him, the idea of signing the Portuguese obeyed the compelling desire to win the Champions League, a title that has escaped the bianconera squad most recently in 2015 and 2017. With CR7 the last two years, the thing does not has changed.
Now, could everything done by Cristiano be categorized as a “failure”? Here we show you his numbers and performance since he left his beloved Real Madrid to embark on a new adventure in his career.
‘El Bambino’ argued in the media that with Ronaldo on track “they did worse than before” in the top European competition. The three most recent editions of the pageant, without Cristiano obviously, left a balance of elimination in the round of 16 (2015-16), runners-up (2016-17) and elimination in the quarterfinals (2017-18); the other two with the Portuguese have finished fourth (2018-19), eighth (2019-20) and are currently in the key of eighth against Porto (duel they lost in the first leg by 1-2).
So, in terms of results, the thing, you could say, goes hand in hand. It remains to be seen what may happen this season. Of course, the need for the title is non-negotiable.
On the other hand, it is worth detailing the influence of Portuguese in each of the two editions he has played. At 18-19 he scored six of the 14 goals his team scored in the tournament, almost 50% of production. In addition he was great hero in the key of eighth before the Athletic one of Madrid with a triplet (3-2 global) and marked the unique two goals of his equipment in the eliminatory one before the Ajax (2-3 global) . Absolutely nothing to complain about.
The following season his goal-scoring output dropped to four goals in eight games, but he still appeared in the round of 16 with a double against Lyon, but failed to score a goal difference. That being the case, it can be said without any problem that he has fulfilled in scoring matters. He appeared in the keys of direct elimination with minimum two goals, something that few soccer players are able to do, and was MVP of their club in those parties.
Cassano’s other argument is that “Cristiano has nothing to do with Andrea’s ideas (Pirlo)”, a situation he compared to Maurizio Sarri, and in this sense “he participates little … he made it fatal these three years” .
However, analyzing Cristiano’s statistics in previous seasons, the sample of his participation and influence is demonstrated.
In the 2018-19 season he scored 28 goals and gave up 10 assists, meaning he generated 38 goal actions in 43 games. He finished fourth in the table of scorers and fifth in the table of assistants. In addition to clearing to score the only goal in the achievement of the Superliga that year.
He finished 19-20 with an average of 0.8 goals per game, a product of 37 points and five assists in 46 games. In the League he scored 31 of his team’s 76 goals, almost half of which were his own!
Currently, under the leadership of Andrea Pirlo, his performance has gone further. He has 26 goals and three assists in 29 games, a situation that leaves him with a guaranteed direct participation in every game of Juventus. All this at 36 years old.
Thus, over these three years in the ‘Vecchia Signora’, CR7 has participated directly in 109 goals (91 scoring and 18 assisting) in the 118 matches he has played. If that is participating a little, what would it be like if you participated a lot.
Based on all the above it is undeniable that the great debt of the Portuguese star goes through the titles, being something collective. Of couse. But analyzing his individual performance, there is no doubt that he has fulfilled in offensive matters and has made a leap in quality to the team. Perhaps this final gear is missing, the total responsibility of the shift coach, so that his goal-scoring greed complements a firm, organized and effective system.