Cristiano Ronaldo believes the overhead bicycle kick he scored for Real Madrid against his current club Juventus last season was better than Mohamed Salah’s which won the FIFA goal of the year award.
“Salah deserved to win the Puskas award, it was a good goal. But let’s be honest, let’s not lie to ourselves, my goal was the best,” Ronaldo told his 142 million Instagram followers.
The 33-year-old Portuguese star lost out to former Real Madrid teammate Luka Modric for the FIFA best player award and to Liverpool’s Salah for the Puskas Award for the best goal.
Salah won the award for his curling strike against Everton in the Premier League in December.
“I’m not disappointed, life is like that, sometimes you win and others lose, what interests me is that in 15 years of career I managed to maintain the same levels of performance,” Ronaldo said.
“Awards are awards… I already have a lot. I play to win and not to win awards.”
Five days after the awards ceremony in London — which he did not attend — five-time Ballon d’Or winner Ronaldo hailed his former Real teammate, saying:
“Congratulations to everyone, to Modric, best player of the year according to FIFA.” Ronaldo scored his acrobatic goal in the Champions League quarter-finals against Juventus before joining the Serie A giants just months later.
The reigning seven-time Italian champions take on Napoli in a top-of-the-table clash Saturday. Juventus lead Napoli by three points after six games.
“It will be a good game, we want to win against a great team, it’s an important day,” added Ronaldo.