Maybe… Haven’t watched pre-injury Ronaldo, but judging by the clips he was more about insane skills, close control, change of pace, much better in tight areas, also powerful runs, acceleration… But didn’t burst past players in open, large, areas as often as Henry did, making those long sprints. At least I got that impression, idk.
Of course it wasn’t just sheere pace, that skill to catch the opponent on the wrong foot was Henry’s biggest quality and probably made him appear even faster than he really was.
We Arsenal fans appreciate Henry but unfortunately outside of the UK he doesn’t get the credit he deserves, (maybe in France) maybe that’s to do with our lack of success in Europe or the fact he was robbed of a Ballon dor but I think Henry is criminally underrated. He was elite and for me on a level with R9, in my opinion he was more versatile than R9. I remember R9 when he moved to Inter and during the 98 WC was around 10/11 and used to watch Gazetta Italia religiously and the games that would come on sundays and all of Inters uefa cup run plus watched all the games in the WC.
R9 had super hype around him and had almost a mythical status reputation wise, however when you watched him he would often go missing during games and for me personally as kid watching him didn’t live up to the hype surrounding him. His legend is greater than him in my opinion for me Prime Henry is as good if not better than R9.
With all due respect, I think you have to be an Arsenal fan to have the opinion that Henry was better than peak R9.
I’d be quite comfortable in saying that R9 post injuries 02-04 was as good as any player in the world and he was about 60% of the player he was in his prime.
R9 had it all. He literally had no weaknesses and was a huge big game player who lived for the big occasions. He was that striker who reinvented the role altogether. And the fact that all these years later people hold him in the same regard as Messi and CR7 (and some even argue his prime ability was better than those two) says a lot about his stature in the game.
And it’s funny you mention the missing in games thing, Henry was renowned for going missing in big games when it mattered most haha. It was a big criticism labelled at him.
R9 was peak from only 96-99 though. He lost a step in the 00s
Henry was a better or equal goalscorer bar world cups when both were active. And he was massively more creative player than any stage of Ronaldo’s career
To be fair I was young at the time but considering the hype around him after that Barca season, I don’t think he lived up to it, I remember at the time watching something saying that he was bought in so they could win a scudetto which never happened (not Ronaldo’a fault). His career really took a nose dive when he went to Italy and at the time people were saying it’s because he couldn’t hack the Italian league (which at the time was the best league in the world) and really it wasn’t until he went back to Spain that his career took off again.
I’m not saying he wasn’t good or one of the best who ever did it, however I feel a lot of players unfairly get looked over when compared to him, Ronaldinho being a prime example. In my opinion I do think that ability wise Henry is on par with him, and should also be considered in that elite category.
He was at his best when he first moved to Inter and had a great first season. But he suffered 2 knee injuries, the last one was seen at the time as potentially career ending. After he came back he wasn’t quite as quick, not nearly as fit and was overweight. Probably 80-90% of what he was
People still are underestimating what Henry achieved here. No ones done 20+ goals plus 20 assists before or since.
Come on bro this just isn’t true. He has a ridiculous goal record in Italy, win player of the year in his only full season in Italy, UEFA best forward, won the World Cup best player award in 1998.
Ronaldo is widely considered the best player to play in the Serie A in the 90s. His career did not take a nose dive in Italy his absolute peak as a player was his time at Inter.
You could read any Inter fans opinion of him and aside from them not liking him - they have an insane opinion of his talent at Inter Milan.
Hell the only reason they didn’t win the Serie A is because of some of the most blatantly corrupt officiating you could ever see.
Yeah I remember, can’t remember who it was against but it was successive. He had literally just come back from injury and during the game did his knee again. I think in that first season inter were like one point of Juve.
Off topic but funny, I remember after that Inter brought in Vieiri for some insane fee at the time (£32m) and he was being interviewed on channel 4, spoke fluent English with a very heavy Aussie accent I remember thinking WTF
I think I might of miss worded that, I meant in the sense of injuries not performance wise. First season he was unbelievable, tore it up in the league and the UEFA cup but after that first season he was plagued with injuries, and was never able to recapture that first season level in my opinion.
I agree with you bro that he’s considered one of the best, because he was. I was a massive Inter fan, got all of their home kits from 97-2003 including a couple of the away ones, I love the guy. But in my opinion ability wise TH14 is on his level.
Henry has his 20 plus goals and 20 plus assists season in this window, did Ronaldo manage anything comparable within this period?
I’m not saying stats are the be all and end all, but its something of an indicator and worth looking at, particularly if we’re saying Ronaldo had it all and had no weaknesses (not something I disagree with)
I don’t think Henry is better overall, but within that period there’s an discussion to be had I reckon.
Under Wenger Henry also re-defined what a striker could be when he’d drift to be a left winger to link up play and create or play on the defenders shoulder like a typical striker.
I think the Thierry Henry in 2003-04 is better than the R9 in the same time period. I do still think post injuries R9 was as good as any striker in the world in a certain time period even though you’d argue he lost at least 30% of his peak powers.
What I do totally disagree with is that peak Henry was better than peak R9.
I’d also like to point out to a certain poster that I do not wish to engage with is that R9 re-defined the striker role long before Henry ever did it. Guys like Henry themselves credit R9 with re-defining the striker role. What R9 did was drop deep, drift wide, come away from the box and create chances for himself.
I remember thinking WTF