Real Madrid took an early 1-0 lead against Atlético Madrid on Sunday, then spent the rest of the match trying to defend it. They failed, and the game ended in a 1-1 draw. Cristiano Ronaldo was bad and our Real Madrid blogger Lucas Navarrete pointed out how much of a problem it was.
Is Cristiano Ronaldo a bad big-game player?
Cristiano Ronaldo has a reputation for bottling it in big games, but Real Madrid haven’t put him in a great position to succeed.
Gonzalo Arroyo Moreno/Getty Images
Ramos and Ronaldo are earning €10 million and €20 million to perform in games like this one.
— Lucas Navarrete (@LucasNavarreteM) October 4, 2015 Cristiano's shooting stats. Wow. pic.twitter.com/FvG0UnCav3
— Lucas Navarrete (@LucasNavarreteM) October 4, 2015 Spanish football journalist and Sky Sports pundit Guillem Balague took it a step further. He said Ronaldo hasn’t been a big-game player for quite a while.
Ronaldo keeps struggling in big games as he has done for over a year now. Benzema keeps growing but Real have lost the ball in this 2nd half
— Guillem Balague (@GuillemBalague) October 4, 2015 No, he hasn't. False myth. But last big game with Madrid the 2011 Cup final perhaps? https://t.co/kValrUK91k
— Guillem Balague (@GuillemBalague) October 4, 2015 I wondered, is this true? I’ve watched every single “big game” that Real Madrid has played since that Copa del Rey in in 2011, but I do not have a superhuman memory. While previously watching those games could help me work out a loose count of games where Ronaldo was good, great or poor without watching all of them in their entirety, I was going to need a refresher. So in the name of trying to answer this entirely subjective question, I proceeded to spend about five hours poring through game logs, match reports and highlights when I really should have gone outside or something.
I classified “big games” as any game against Barcelona or Atlético Madrid, plus Champions League quarterfinals and later. I took some liberties with that criteria, omitting a Champions League quarterfinal against APOEL and adding in a Champions League Round of 16 tie against Manchester United. I decided if Ronaldo was exceptional, good, meh or poor in each match and rounded them up. If you want to scrutinize individual game grades, they’re all here.
So, has Ronaldo been crap in big games over the last couple of years? Yeah, kind of.
OK, here’s the breakdown of game grades by time period.
All games since the 2011 Copa del Rey final:
12 Bad
7 Meh
22 Good
7 Exceptional
3 DNP
Just the end of the 2010-11 season, plus full 2011-12, 2012-13 seasons:
4 Bad
3 Meh
11 Good
5 Exceptional
1 DNP
Since the start of the 2013/14 season:
8 Bad
4 Meh
11 Good
2 Exceptional
2 DNP
The frequency of performances that could be considered exceptional has taken a serious downturn. And I gave him that grade for setting up the tie-winning goal against Atlético Madrid in Champions League last year, just because it was a brilliant assist of a massive goal, even if he didn’t have a great game. The other exceptional grade comes from a Champions League semifinal win over Bayern Munich in 2014. Before that, his last exceptional performance was in a 2013 Copa del Rey win over Barcelona. The last league Clásico where I gave him an excellent grade was in October of 2012.
But here’s the thing.
It’s not all his fault.
Carlo Ancelotti’s no slouch of a manager, but he also wasn’t in the business of fighting with Florentino Perez about Galácticos and converting center backs to defensive midfield just to play the way he wanted to play. Ancelotti’s a yes-man, and he did the best he could with Perez’s renewed Galácticos policy. Previous Real Madrid boss Jose Mourinho is always pragmatic, even if his team played some great soccer at times, and kept Perez in check a bit. Rafa Benitez seems to be somewhere between the two -- an ultra-pragmatic, stuck in his ways manager who is also a yes-man.
Since Mourinho’s departure, there have been a lot of games where Ronaldo was good, but the midfield and defense behind him were irreparably broken. In last season’s games away to Juventus and at home against Schalke in Champions League, away to Barcelona and at home against Atlético Madrid in the league, and in the second leg of the Copa del Rey tie against Atléti, Ronaldo was one of very few useful players on the pitch. He got hung out to dry by a combination of bad tactics and bad individual performances from teammates, then took the brunt of the blame when he wasn’t able to will the team to victory by himself.
Say what you will about Barcelona's defense, but at least Lionel Messi always has Sergio Busquets or Javier Mascherano marshaling the midfield behind him. Ronaldo's never really had this luxury.
Some combination of bad coaching, bad team chemistry, bad transfer decisions by his team president and bad luck has prevented Ronaldo from reaching his full potential over the last two seasons. Just because Real Madrid is one of the biggest clubs in the world with the biggest net spend almost every transfer window doesn't mean he's been put into a position to succeed.
But while Ronaldo’s reputation as a big-game bottler is unearned, he didn’t show up against Atléti. He didn’t face an incredible opponent on Sunday, or play in a broken team with awful teammates. He just didn’t play well. On this particular occasion, he lived up to his undeserved reputation, so it’s going to persist.
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