‘Ronaldo is a killer, but Messi will torture you before he kills you – Wayne Rooney weighs in on world’s best player debate

Manchester United and England’s highest goalscorer, Wayne Rooney, has given his input into the debate on who is the world’s best player.

Since 2007, Juventus’ Cristiano Ronaldo and Barcelona’s Lionel Messi have gone on to win the World’s Best Player prize 11 times between them, with Luka Modric the only player to snatch the award, and that was in 2018 following an extraordinary World Cup campaign in Russia.

Rooney, who is friends with Ronaldo and was his former teammate at Manchester United says he believes Messi is better than Ronaldo and should be considered the best on the planet.

On Sunday, the Derby County captain wrote in his Sunday Times column: “Ronaldo wasn’t as focused on goals when we started playing together but you could see that all he wanted was to be the best player in the world.

“He practised and practised and began to produce. Cristiano has become an incredible scorer and he and Messi are arguably the best two players the game has seen.

“But despite my friendship with Cristiano, I’d go for Messi. It’s for the same reason I loved watching Xavi and [Paul] Scholes: it’s the different things in Messi’s game.

“I’ve talked about composure and I can’t remember seeing Messi score when he has hit the ball as hard as he could. He just rolls them in, makes it so easy,” he added.

“Ronaldo is ruthless in the box, a killer. But Messi will torture you before he kills you. With Messi you just get the impression he is having more fun.