26 April 2023 , 12:17
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Paulo Dybala is one of the select group of players who have been teammates of both Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.
Dybala is currently at Italian club Roma, having joined the Giallorossi from Juventus as a free agent this summer. He spent three seasons as a teammate of Ronaldo at the Bianconeri, with the two often being paired together in attack in Turin.
During these years, Dybala was a crucial player for the Argentina international team alongside their talisman Messi. He has subsequently been part of the South American nation’s squad for winning the Copa America in 2021 and the World Cup in Qatar last year.
Alongside Ronaldo, he won three successive Serie A titles with Juventus. The Portuguese superstar joined the Old Lady in the summer of 2018 from Real Madrid – where he had netted a scarcely believable 450 goals in 438 appearances – and scored 101 goals across his stint in Italy.
Dybala has now outlined a conversation he had with Ronaldo before a Juventus game, admitting to his teammate that his background as an Argentine had led to him ‘hating’ the Portuguese due to his intense long-term sporting rivalry with Messi.
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“I spent three nice years with Cristiano, the team was very strong and he added something more,” Dybala told an interview with DAZN, in quotes carried by Football Italia.
Dybala and Ronaldo scored over 100 goals together when starting (Andrea Staccioli/Insidefoto/LightRocket via Getty Images)Have Your Say! Has Ronaldo or Messi enjoyed the better career? Tell us what you think here.
“There’s a big rivalry between Messi and Ronaldo in Argentina. Once, we were flying out for a game, I was sitting at the back of the plane and he was slightly ahead. At some point, he came to me, we spoke about life in general for a while, and I told him: ‘As a kid, I practically hated you.’ We laughed about it and we’ve always been on good terms.”
Dybala’s previous thoughts on Ronaldo certainly were no deterrent to the players forming an understanding and bonding at Juve, with other Argentines – such as Gonzalo Higuain, Gabriel Heinze and Lisandro Martinez – playing alongside Ronaldo at club level throughout his career.
The same is true for multiple Portugal internationals playing alongside Messi at club level, including Nelson Semedo, Andre Gomes, Vitinha and Renato Sanches, while Sergio Ramos and Keylor Navas are among the players to play alongside Ronaldo and Messi at club level.