Cristiano Ronaldo surpassed Pele in international goals this past weekend. Can he break the Brazilian’s legendary record of 1,283 goals for club and country?
In an exclusive interview with Goal.com, Pele once again congratulated Ronaldo (after already congratulation him on Twitter) for eclipsing his incredible scoring tally of 77 career goals with Brazil.
Congratulations @Cristiano for joining the elite five of #FIFA international goal scorers. Parabéns!
— Pelé (@Pele) September 1, 2017
“Of course, these are different times, but the beautiful thing about football is the goals. And I take this opportunity to send a big greeting to Cristiano Ronaldo for that victory.”
“Now he has to score more than 1,283 goals!”
When it comes to international goals, Pele’s 77 goals were a record that stood for decades. Now, only 4 players stand between Portugal’s #7 and eternal glory: Godfrey Chitalu from Zambia, with 79 goals in 4th position, Kunishige Kamamoto from Japan, with 80 goals in 3rd position, Ex-Real Madrid player, Ferenc Puskás from Hungary, with 84 goals in 2nd position. Finally, Ali Daei from Iran leads the list, with a mind-blowing 109 goals.
Club-and-country wise, here is a little fact: Pele’s record isn’t so unbelievable.
Only 757 goals were in competitive matches. The rest were in friendlies. On the other hand, Ronaldo has scored 626 competitive goals and ranks at 6th, just behind Pele. The player with the most, however, is Josef “Pepi” Bican, with a stunning 805 goals!
Interestingly, among the top 5 is a Real Madrid’s legend, that’s the late Ferenc Puskás. The Hungarian ranks 4th with 700 goals.
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A simple calculation reveals that Ronaldo needs 45 goals per season to surpass Bican. It will be difficult for Cristiano considering his age, but it’s still achievable nonetheless. Zidane’s usage of the 4-4-2 diamond formation will surely help Ronaldo. In this
In this formation, he’ll be closer to goal so he is sure to get more chances than in his traditional winger position. The first leg in El Classico was absolute proof that Ronaldo can wreak so much havoc as an outright striker.
Most footballers start to decline by the age of 30. Ronaldo seems a wild exception. Despite stats showing that Ronaldo has declined in terms of scoring goals, the Portuguese player is showing that his best is yet to come. Since Ronaldo turned 30, he has won two Champions Leagues, two European Super Cups, one La Liga title, a Super Copa and two FIFA Club World Cup. Of course, these aren’t individual achievements but it’s a fact that he was crucial in almost all of them.
Individually he has won “FIFA the Best Award” and a Ballon d’Or. He will probably win both awards again by the start of next year. He also won this year’s UEFA Best Player and best forward awards.
Not to mention that he had twin children this summer and is expecting a baby with his current girlfriend Georgina Rodriguez.
Ronaldo is definitely not slowing down anytime soon and has a great chance of breaking Pele’s all-time goal record.
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