3 reasons why Cristiano Ronaldo will not cross the 800-goal mark

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Ronaldo has now scored 700 career goals

With his second-half penalty against Ukraine at the Kyiv Olympic Stadium, Cristiano Ronaldo wrote his name into the record books once again as only the sixth player in history to have scored 700 career goals.

As you'd expect, the bulk of those goals have come at club level. Ronaldo has registered 605 goals across his four spells with Sporting Lisbon, Manchester United, Real Madrid and Juventus, while 95 have been scored in the colors of Portugal.

With 700 career goals ticked off his to-do list, the narrative has understandably turned to whether the Madeira native can bag the next century and become the second player to score 800 goals before he hangs up his boots.

While there may be some plausible reasons why Ronaldo could reach that mark, it is also possible that he will fail to score 800 goals before he calls time on an illustrious career.

In this piece, we look at three reasons why Ronaldo will not cross the 800-goal mark.

#3 His numbers have been dwindling in recent years

Ronaldo deserves immense praise for his consistency throughout his career, particularly as he approached his 30s. However, a look at his numbers in recent years would show that his goals have been dwindling.

Between 2009 and 2012, Ronaldo posted better returns than the preceding year and In the 2013 calendar year, the Portuguese international had his best return, scoring 60 goals for club and country from just 59 matches. A year later he scored 61 from 60, and this marked the start of his dwindling returns.

Last year, he failed to hit the 50-goal mark for the first time in eight years. It looks likely that he will fail to achieve that once again this year; with a little over two months left, he has scored just 27 goals.

For all of his greatness, Ronaldo is not immune to the law of diminishing returns. And with his goal average reducing with each passing year, it is possible that he will not break the 800-goal barrier.

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