Well isn’t this a never ending battle? These two giants are at it again, and this time it’s the race to become the first Champions League Centurion! Since the start of this years season it was almost apparent that Cristiano Ronaldo is uncontested here and that he will be the first one to rack up 100 Champions League goals, but as it is his style, Lionel Messi stormed right back into the fight scoring nine goals in last four games.
If you remember 2014, then you must know that Lionel Messi broke Raul’s record of 71 strikes in Europe’s premier cup competition back then which was quite a news. But what was even bigger one is that Ronaldo managed to score past his fiercest rival with 16 goals during Real Madrid’s triumph last season. This has helped the Portuguese superstar to reach the mark of 93 goals in the Champions League putting him in a comfortable lead of ten goals over Lionel Messi. Things are slightly different now in the mid of the season since it turned up to be a slow start for Ronaldo where he managed to score just twice, while his arch rival is on fire once again.
Messi started his season scoring three goals out of total seven which Barcelona packed into Celtics net when they demolished Scottish representative at Camp Nou. This allowed Messi to take the Champions League hat-tricks record, which he previously shared with Ronaldo, for himself. Messi continued this hot streak with another triple score against Manchester City and managed to score again in the return game at Etihad Stadium. Messi is now, after a double score at Celtic Park on match day five, firmly sitting in second place with 92 goals, just three goals behind Ronaldo in the race to become the first Champions League Centurion.
Barcelona is finishing their group stage at home where they are waiting for the Borussia Monchengladbach on December 6th, and that is when Messi will know if he can score another hat-trick that will allow him to break Ronaldo’s group-stage record of 11 goals which he managed to set last year. If Messi manages to pull this one, then it will definitely seal him as a superstar player, especially after he played only four games in the group stage, missing his team’s trip to Monchengladbach on their second match because of an injury.
Cristiano Ronaldo, naturally can not influence any of that but since he has a three-goal lead to Messi, he will most certainly try to be on top of his game when Madrid hosts Borussia Dortmund at the Santiago Bernabeu on December 7th. This will be his clear shot to come closer to the desired figure of 100 goals. We can only wish them both luck and end this article with – May the best man win!
