The Best Game Cristiano Ronaldo Played
The best game Cristiano Ronaldo played was the one he didn’t.
On July 10, 2016, France and Portugal were faced in the final of the European Football Championship at the ‘Stade de France’, Saint-Denis, with over 75,000 attendees. Portugal’s average squad age 28.4.
France’s average squad age 27.95. Portugal had 8 players above 30 years of age, and France had 4 players over 30 years of age.
Ronaldo was undoubtedly at the height of his career just like the years before and was the invincible, inevitable striker because of his statistical records and undefeatable quality. Few players at the highest level of any game prioritize winning and scoring points like Cristiano Ronaldo. He has taken away the spotlight several times away from whole squads while on the pitch making him an undeniable icon despite many’s likes and dislikes.
The Route to the final for Portugal was an unlikely predictor for victory in the tournament. In contrast, France reached the final with more wins, and a triumph over the 2014 world cup champions Germany in the semifinals.
Portugal, with Ronaldo onboard, scraped through the whole tournament by beating Croatia in extra time and Poland on penalties.
As the game kicked off both teams began to find their place on the pitch with a few long balls across the penalty boxes, headers and missed shots. As the game was warming up in the 8th minute, Dimitri Payet tackled Ronaldo, visibly hurting him in the knee. By the 25th minute, Ronaldo left the field on a stretcher. France had the tournament’s top three scorers on the field, and Portugal had 29-year-old Nani as their only striker, who had 3 goals to his name. Quaresma replaced Ronaldo, and there on France unleashed their attacking power on Portugal. Portugal became one force sticking together, the element of Ronaldo, unquestionably the best player in Europe, if contested in the world, had left the field.
Cristiano is known to make the team feed his playing style both in club and country. In 2016 he was playing for Real Madrid, clearly overshadowing teammates like Karim Benzema and Gareth Bale. Fast forward 6 years, Benzema is leading the way for Real Madrid from where Ronaldo left.
It is hard to say that Portugal may have lost the game if Cristiano had played. But what would have happened if Cristiano stayed on the field was that the psyche expectation of the team would be to feed Ronaldo and have him score because he can and he will. The French defense would see the same and organize their defense to stop the Portuguese duo, Nani and Ronaldo, with Ronaldo as the primary striker.
As Ronaldo left the field, the French defense knew that their penalty box was safe. A lone Nani had to take more shots from outside the box to compensate for the lack of dribbles and attacks.
During the game, the French certainly had more possession, 53% to 47%. Overall, 9 shots, 9 corners, and 13 free kicks, giving them an edge over the Portuguese in the number of chances that usually lead to a goal in soccer. Portugal had barely 27 chances in total.
France knew they had a chance to win since their opponent’s best player was off the field, and Portugal knew that they had to fill in the mental gap Ronaldo had left in them.
Perhaps 33 years old Pepe and 32 years old Quaresma knew this well. Pepe defended so well that it earned him the ‘Man of the Match’ title.
There is no doubt that Ronaldo was the Portuguese scoring machine and could have probably scored in the final as well if he were to play beyond his 25th-minute exit. But what he did to his team mentally is not explainable statistically to the bare eyes of an audience. This is the power of unseen energy that a person leaves behind or brings in any environment they are a part of. Ronaldo was able to create that energy during the tournament. 3 draws in the group stages of the tournament show how dependent the team had become on Ronaldo. If all players realized their potential while Cristiano was on the field, they would have easily swept through the tournament. Indeed, that would have required each player to adjust their physical and mental performance. The ‘Ronaldo Effect’ is like the power of a superhero in a movie. The superhero is the main character, and everyone feeds him to stay one. Every superhero also subtly shows that anyone can be a superhero. Unfortunately, their absence allows people to realize that they too can be one. The idea of masked superheroes like Spiderman, Batman, and Superman accommodates the thought that the movie watcher feels they too can be the superhero. Since the mask is usually on during heroic scenes, the audience connects more with the mask than the person behind the mask. To feel connected to a superhero is much harder when you see that the other person is a real person, because they embody the personality. You, therefore, realize the hard work you must do to be a hero. When the ‘Rocky’ movies were playing in the cinemas in the 1980s and 1990s, it would have been tough for another boxing-themed movie to overshadow the film because Sylvester Stallone had very well embodied the ultimate bare chest boxing hero. His enactment of a boxing hero was so real that he inspired a generation of real boxers and not movies. He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2011 at 64.
Back to the summer of 2016, with Cristiano Ronaldo on the field, it would have been very hard for any of his teammates to overtake the podium from Cristiano. This is why when Cristiano left the field, he left a void to fill. He transferred this energy to all of his teammates, from Patricio in the goal to Eder, in the 109th minute, who scored from 23 meters against Hugo Lloris, who had kept 3 clean sheets in the tournament. The French had everything to dominate the game, and they did so very well. They broke behind the Portuguese defense number of times but were stopped by the goalie.
They took shots from afar when the Portuguese defense squeezed them outside the box. What the French didn’t do was to break the Portuguese spirit in those 130 minutes. And Cristiano Ronaldo’s departure from the field created that opportunity to do so. His void was so evident and shocking that Portugal pulled together as soon as that stretcher left the field. Great leaders can live through people even when they are physically not present.
Similarly, governments are hesitant to take down leaders at the height of the uprisings because the void they leave behind can lead to far greater chaos than the one with them. The Roman Senate was not afraid of dissenting military generals in ancient Rome, but rather the Roman mob. A leaderless mob would have burned cities if a leader they believed was taken down by the Senate.
Great people who live with purpose and lead by example are often far more inspiring after their lifetime or when they leave the room after a great speech. This is how legends are born. They are held in our minds with the power of the belief they embody. This is the power Cristiano Ronaldo had over the 2016 Euro Final. When he left the field, his team pulled together far beyond any game Ronaldo played. Whenever Ronaldo was on the sidelines jumping and cheering, he passed on the belief of victory to his team. At the end of the 90th minute, when he hugged and spoke to Eder, Quaresma, and others individually, he made them believe that they were the superheroes of the game, and Cristiano Ronaldo was nothing but an injured teammate. Such is the power of belief; such is the power of a leader who can inspire. Very few people in the history of our tiny world have lived to die as inspirations for the rest of us.
‘Jornal de Noticias,’ a Portuguese daily newspaper, called Portugal’s victory over France the greatest moment in the history of Portuguese football. (UEFA, 2016)
‘A Bola,’ another Portuguese publication, called every player a ‘hero’, true to the players’ belief and performance. (UEFA, 2016)
The final outcome should not take the credit away from a superior French side who went on to come back and win a greater tournament, the FIFA World Cup 2018. The French newspaper ‘L’Equipe’ was quick to critique their own heroes and rightly question Portugal’s win. They wrote, “Portugal were a team within reach, less strong than Germany, but in football, it’s not always the best team that wins.” “France lose again, and it’s far from certain that they will bounce back quickly, given what the history of French football has taught us about the difficulty of carrying out big tasks and the sluggishness of our accomplishments.” (UEFA, 2016) Nevertheless, the Les Bleus proved their own media that they could come back at a much bigger stage.
The Italian paper ‘Corriere Della Sera’ wrote that Portugal “were almost better without Ronaldo.” (Uefa, 2016)
‘Het Laatste Nieuws’ wrote, “Everything Cristiano Ronaldo has given to Portugal, he now gets returned by his teammates with the Cup.” (UEFA, 2016)
Spanish paper ‘AS’ may have criticized Portugal for not playing football. “Portugal certainly didn’t play football to go down in the annals of the beautiful game at France 2016, but they won’t care: they’re European Champions.” (UEFA, 2016) ‘AS’ didn’t mention that you don’t have to play the textbook style of any game to win the game. What is more important to win is to have the heart to play till the last second of the game. That heartbeat drove Portugal every second of the final. Ronaldo left the pitch, but he left behind his play, 11X. Those who have the ability to win may not have the mentality to play, but those who have the ability to play will certainly have the mentality to win.
What the power our presence brings may just be a fragment of what our absence can leave behind.
This inspiration in the Portuguese team, the way one Cristiano left the pitch and 11 entered it, is why the best game Cristiano Ronaldo played was the one he didn’t.
UEFA.com. (2016, July 11). The world’s media react to the UEFA Euro 2016 final. UEFA.com. Retrieved March 12, 2022, from https://www.uefa.com/uefaeuro-2020/news/0253-0d81c4e6f80d-f755be663f40-1000--the-world-s-media-react-to-the-uefa-euro-2016-final/
