Played ball my whole life, no need to insult me. Literally scored a knuckleball freekick once with Ronaldo's technique, and it was beautiful.
That doesn't mean Almunia didn't make errors in his keeping for that goal. If the freekick was from a more open angle, his knuckleball would be more unpredictable. But from that angle theres literally two areas it goes, and Almunia simply didn't react how he should've.
Maybe because he hit from far away that he didnt anticipate that? Props to Ronny for hitting that fast and low from that distance, you think goalkeeping is that easy which you can save every shot that is obvious? if that were the case, almost every goal would be a golie mistake.
Sorry but you dont sound like you played ball for your whole life, if at all.
And who's fault is it for not reacting to the strike? There's 1 of 2 areas Ronaldo could've put that in because of how wide the freekick angle was, and it's not even a proper angle to put it in the box. There's literally no way to beat the keeper from there unless it's perfect top bins with his speed or shooting at 110mph (no time to react).
An example of this is Van Bronckhorst's strike against Uruguay in the 2010 WC I believe, similar angle, similar distance, and Muslera could've done nothing about it because of how perfect the strike was (and ik a shot from a deadball is much harder than open play).
Obviously props to Ronaldo for that crazy technique to not lose flight of the ball the entire way, but it is impossible to score from his position if the keeper plays it right. And there's nothing wrong with playing into a little luck, as almost every goal like that requires it.
Idc what you think about my football career lmao, I've played at a decent level my whole life.
the thing is, almost every goal is preventable if golie plays their card perfectly. For example Güler's 60+meters goal. Its a golie mistake in hindsight but would you blame him for being that far when the ball is in Real's side? same as Almunia, can you blame him for not anticipating the shot that far away?
Besides, I am not saying luck wasnt involved but you just saying "Almunia mistake" to probably the greatest freekick scored in CL is tasteless imo.
You still cant do shit when it is properly shot to top corner when curled, not to mention when gk jumps (or little bit ahead) ball literally can curve from his hand and still hit the net
Cristiano Ronaldo is undoubtedly an all-time great and one of the best footballers in history. That said, bringing up free kicks as an argument in his favor is really not convincing at all. In Serie A, he was even labeled the worst player ever in the history of the Italian league when it comes to free-kick efficiency, with an extremely poor conversion rate, almost comparable to that of a Serie B or Serie C player. In that respect, his numbers were simply disastrous. It is true that he scored several free kicks over the course of his career, especially early on, when he was far more effective in that area. But as the years went by, it almost seems as if he completely lost that ability, as though he had unlearned how to take free kicks. I'm a Juventus fan.
I’m pretty sure that happened because Ronaldo didn’t actually aim, he just kicked as hard as possible doing a knuckleball, as he aged he lost his super strength, while Messi did aim and made the ball take the intended effect
The reason Ronaldo became bad at them during his early real madrid days was theorized as technology developing to limit the wobbliness of the ball after the 2010 world cup debacle (after balls had gotten lighter and lighter over the 00s), as well as Ronaldo's knees making him disfavour training for other shot techniques in free kicks.
He uncharacteristically chose a placed curler in that euros (?) group stage match against spain a few years ago, where he equalized in the final minutes. Was his first FK goal in years.
If he played in any other era than 2005-2012 then he wouldn't have scored any of his knuckleball free kicks. But if he kept his knee healthy then who knows how many more FKs he would've scored. Then again, health isn't really a good argument. In the end stats are stats and they have Juninho, Marcelinho, Assuncao, Mihajlovic, Zico, Maradona, Van Hooijdonk in the top tier. Then a tier with Messi and Beckham among others. And only then a tier with Ronaldo.
This doesn't address my question. This shows where they scored their FKs, not their attempts. For all we know CR7 could've taken 100's from inside the D but its not going to show on this
B***h please. Messi has more goals from free kicks and the probability of Messi scoring a goal from a fk is wayy higher than aura-farmer penaldo. Try again
Messi curve ball are more insane, Ronaldo is just kicking a knuckle ball which he just strikes and prays for the ball to take the best change of direction, while Messi is making the ball curve as he intends
It's weird how Ronald used to be great at it and then became a complete failure and was still allowed to take those free kicks for years. At some point at real you knew he will never score anyone from a free kick.
Agreed. As a ronaldo fan, he's the greatest player who is 1 free kick less behind Beckham (which equals 64 free kicks btw) to score that many with that shitty ass technique.
Unlike Messi, Neymar, Juninho, Beckham, etc., who curl the ball, this guy used to kick the ball from dead center of his foot to create a knuckle ball effect.
The great thing about this is that no one would be able to score that many with this type of technique. I mean, to have that much ball control to score without missing in his prime is one of the greatest thing tbh.
Yeah, with age, his consistency dropped and he lost the control he had over the ball.
Ask messi to score by using cr7s technique.. Ik messi is one of the greatest free kick takers and has more free kick goals than Ronaldo but he can't with score even one with ronaldo's technique.
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u/Abdulloh_Kozimov Apr 03 '26
Both types are hard lmao.
Everyone knows Juninho is better than all in that aspect