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Lionel Messi will leave Barcelona at some point, that is a fact. When he leaves is still up for debate. What won’t be much of a debate is that Barcelona’s attack will suffer tremendously from the Argentine’s departure.
It’s a no-brainer that a team won’t score as often after the best attacking player leaves. The real question is how bad will it get? Cristiano Ronaldo leaving Real Madrid gives a good idea of what could happen with Barcelona in terms of offense.
Real Madrid Without Ronaldo
Real Madrid 2017-18 (Ronaldo’s last season with Madrid)
Total Goals (All competitions): 148
Goals Scored By Ronaldo: 44
Next 2 Top Scorers: Gareth Bale (21) and Karim Benzema (12)
Real Madrid 2018-19
Total Goals: 108
Top Scorer: Benzema (30)
Next 2 Top Scorers: Bale (14) and Sergio Ramos (11)
Real Madrid 2019-20
Total Goals: 99
Top Scorer: Benzema (27)
Next 2 Top Scorers: Ramos (13) and Rodrygo (7)
So far in the two seasons since Ronaldo’s departure, Real Madrid has yet to come close to a similar scoring output. The season directly following his departure saw a 27 percent decrease in goals.
This steep drop makes sense as Ronaldo accounted for about 29 percent of Los Blancos’ scoring in his final season.
Now let’s look at Barcelona’s stats from what could be Messi’s last season.
Barcelona 2019-20
Total Goals (All competitions): 110
Goals scored by Messi: 31
Next 2 Top Scorers: Luis Suarez (21) and Antoine Griezmann (15)
If Barcelona suffers the same 27 percent decrease in scoring, then next season’s team would only score 80 goals.
Only a percent off of Ronaldo, the amount of goals that Messi contributed was about 28 percent of Barcelona’s season total. The bleeding for next season might not stop with Messi. Barcelona looks likely to lose Suarez as well, with the Uruguayan on the outs.
Juventus are considering signing Luis Suarez, sources close to the deal have told Goal pic.twitter.com/JyLdN6Obz7
— Goal (@goal) August 27, 2020
These stats aren’t any Magic 8-Ball that will tell the future of the Catalan club, but it provides a good idea of what happens to a club when it loses one of the best players in the world.
