Geoffrey Kondogbia let us all know his take on who he prefers out of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo without even being directly asked the question.
The French international, formerly of Sevilla and Monaco, joined Marcelino's Valencia on a season-long loan from Inter Milan and made his debut in an entertaining 2-2 draw with reigning champions Real Madrid at the Bernabeu last night.
Image: PA
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Marco Asensio opened the scoring for the Zinedine Zidane's side with a typically brilliant goal inside 10 minutes, but Valencia levelled matters through Carlos Soler eight minutes later, before Kondogbia marked his first game at Los Che with a strike to put Valencia 2-1 up in the 77th minute.
Image: PA
Asensio, in the form of his life at the moment, found the net again seven minutes from time to ensure the spoils were shared.
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Kondogbia made a strong start to life at Valencia and was integral to his side holding the best team in world football to a point.
Cristiano Ronaldo was of course absent from the Real Madrid side once again following his five-match ban for pushing the referee after being sent off for two bookable offences in the Spanish Super Sup Cup first leg win over Barcelona.
Image: PA
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And Kondogbia couldn't resist a cheeky dig at the four-time Ballon d'Or winner after the game.
As reported by Spanish newspaper SPORT, the 24-year old was asked about the task at the Bernabeu being made easy by Ronaldo being in the stands rather than on the pitch, with the journalist in question saying "the best player was missing".
That prompted Kondogbia to respond by saying: "I did not know Messi played in Madrid."
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Well there you have it. Kondogbia clearly has Messi higher up in his estimations than Ronaldo.
The reverse fixture between the two sides on 28 January, if both Ronaldo and Kondogbia feature, could make for some interesting viewing.
UPDATE:
Valencia have since denied the "false" comments Kondogbia is said to have made post-game:
Topics: valencia, Cristiano Ronaldo, Real Madrid
