Messi vs Ronaldo in 2023: both leave europe.

2023 is the year the rivalry left Europe and stopped being a direct contest. Ronaldo signed for Al Nassr in Saudi Arabia in January; Messi joined Inter Miami in July and won the inaugural Leagues Cup in his first month there. Sandwiched between those two moves, on 19 January, came the last match either man played against the other — a 5–4 friendly win for Messi's PSG over a Riyadh All-Stars side Ronaldo captained, detailed below. Nothing since has put them on the same pitch.

On the pitch it was Ronaldo's best year since 2018: 54 goals to Messi's 26, a margin of 28 that equals 2012 as the widest in the dataset, and his seventh-best calendar year. In September he scored four against Al Mokawloon in the Arab Club Championship, one of them a 35-yard free kick.

Messi's 26 is his 18th-best year, split across two clubs and two continents, and it still ended with an eighth Ballon d'Or in October — won after lifting the World Cup, extending his own all-time record, with Haaland second and Mbappé third. Ronaldo was not shortlisted for the first time since 2003. In June, Messi had marked his 800th career goal with three in 22 first-half minutes against Curaçao.

Ronaldo's own verdict on the move: "Now the rivalry is over. Both Messi and I are no longer in Europe. We made each other better for many years."