Missing out again: Cristiano Ronaldo loses out on Golden Boot for fourth season in a row
Cristiano Ronaldo's quest to win a domestic Golden Boot fell short for a fourth straight year when he finished fourth in the Serie A top scorers list. But there are plenty of reasons to be cheerful after his first season in Italy.
Ronaldo hit 21 league goals for Juve as he helped fire The Old Lady to the Scudetto and captured the Serie A Player of the Year award in his first season with the club.
But his goals weren't enough to see CR7 win the Serie A Golden Boot, as Sampdoria's 36-year-old veteran Fabio Quagliarella managed five more strikes to finish the campaign on 26 league goals and claim the prestigious top goalscorer's trophy.
Perhaps more surprising than Ronaldo losing out is the margin by which he lost. Ronaldo ended the season FOURTH in the overall Serie A top scorers' list for 2018/19.
Atalanta's Duvan Zapata hit 23 goals to finish runner-up, while AC Milan hitman Krzysztof Piatek also finished ahead of Ronaldo, with 22 goals to his name.
SERIE A TOP GOALSCORERS 2018/19
- Fabio Quagliarella (Sampdoria) - 26
- Duvan Zapata (Atalanta) - 23
- Krzysztof Piatek (AC Milan) - 22
- Cristiano Ronaldo (Juventus) - 21
- Arkadiusz Milik (Napoli) - 17
And while some may point to the fact that Ronaldo is also a creator of goals, rather than simply a penalty-box finisher, this season's golden boot winner Quagliarella also ended the season with eight assists - the same as Ronaldo, and more than any of the other strikers in Serie A's top five.
Some rival fans may use Ronaldo's failure to win the Golden Boot for the fourth year in a row as a means to criticize the Portuguese star, but his contribution nonetheless proved crucial to Juve's dominant season.
While Quagliarella is receiving deserved plaudits for a superb individual season in front of goal, his Sampdoria side finished just ninth in the 20-team Serie A league table this season, having won no more matches than they lost across the 38-game campaign (15 wins, 15 losses).
Ronaldo and Juventus, by contrast, romped to the Scudetto, winning the Italian title by 11 points from closest challengers Napoli, with their talismanic number seven leading from the front.
The best teams in world football cannot afford to be over-reliant on one big-name star, which makes the goalscoring exploits of the likes of Ronaldo and Lionel Messi - who ply their trade in star-studded, world-class lineups - even more impressive.
Ronaldo carried the load as Juve's main goalscoring threat, with little support from his teammates. Juve's next-highest scorer in the league was Croatian striker Mario Mandzukic, but he could only manage nine goals in the league.
And with Juve taking their feet off the pedal and failing to win any of their last five league games, Ronaldo's chances of finishing as the top scorer were severely hampered in the final month of the season.
Ronaldo may not have finished the season at the top of the goalscoring charts, but he can content himself with his first Serie A title - his sixth domestic league title of his career - and the league's Most Valuable Player award, as well as the Supercoppa Italiana.
His Serie A title also meant the Portuguese star became the first player to win top-flight domestic league titles in Italy, Spain and England.
Also on rt.com Wink wonder: Cristiano Ronaldo named Serie A 'MVP' after debut season with JuventusAnd with Juventus rumored to be ready to spend big in the summer to bring reinforcements to Turin to join their superstar frontman, Ronaldo could potentially end up having an even more successful year in his second season with the Italian giants as they look to battle for both Serie A and UEFA Champions League honors in 2019/20.
