Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi continued their tremendous seasons with two big games this past week.

Each player contested a Champions League contest and then sought a new way to lead their respective clubs to Spanish League glory.

Lionel Messi got the first chance to stake his claim as he led Barcelona to a 2-0 win over Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League. It wasn't a banner game for Messi as he failed to score a single goal, did not get an assist and did not even create a key pass the entire night. He had 94 touches on the evening and completed 89.9 percent of the 69 passes he made but only had one shot on target. He did manage a whopping seven dribbles on the night, the highlight of his evening.

In his second game of the week, he had a greater impact as Barcelona pulled out a 2-0 win over Espanyol. He scored a goal on his only shot on target. He had 71 passes on the night, including a key pass and had four dribbles. Again, not his best game overall, but still a solid turn from Messi, who was ultimately overshadowed by teammate Neymar on the week (the Brazilian scored three goals).

Speaking of being overshadowed by a teammate, Ronaldo saw Javier Hernandez steal the spotlight with his three goals on the week, including the winner in the Champions League.

But Ronaldo had nothing to be frustrated about. He put up three shots on target and was unlucky not to score (Jan Oblak made sure of that). He had three key passes on the night, won four aerials and made the most crucial of plays in the dying seconds of a 0-0 play. On most nights, one would expect Ronaldo to take a shot when parked front of net. But he had the presence of mind to notice defenders surrounding him and the wide open Chicharito waiting to fire a shot into the open net. And he made the right decision and his team made it to the Champions League semifinals. The Mexican scored the goal, but Ronaldo was the major catalyst on the goal.

He followed that up with another assist in Real Madrid's nervy 4-2 win at Celta Vigo. Ronaldo actually improved in this game and had one major scoring chance hit the post. He won two aerials, completed over 80 percent of his passes and made two key passes, including his assist.

Season Stats

In the goal scoring race, Messi made up ground by scoring and now trails Ronaldo by three goals. The Portuguese is stuck on 50 goals this year but continued to add to his career-best 21 assists. He is now three assists behind Messi, meaning that the two players have combined on the same number of goals in all competitions this season (71-71).

Messi has more hat tricks than Ronaldo (6-5) and has more goals from open field (42-39), but Ronaldo has more penalty goals (11-5).

In Spain, Ronaldo has 39 goals while Messi has 36; Messi has 16 assists while Ronaldo has 15. Whenever he scores his next goal in Spain, Ronaldo would complete his third 40-goal campaign; Messi would also complete a third 40-goal campaign if he scores four more goals in the final five games of the Spanish League.

Both players are tied on Champions League goals and assists with eight goals and four helpers.

Calendar Year Stats

Messi still leads in this category with 24 goals and 15 assists in 26 appearances in 2015; he has been involved in 39 goals for Barcelona this year, or 50.6 percent of their 77 goals scored in 2015.

Ronaldo has 18 goals and nine assists in 23 matches for club and country; 22 of those games are for Real Madrid. The team has scored 52 goals in 2015, meaning that Ronaldo has been involved in 51.9 percent of them.

Streaking

Since scoring a hat trick against Rayo Vallecano on March 8, Messi has scored a grand total of six goals in 10 straight matches. He has accumulated assists in that run, but the fine goal scoring has not been as consistent. In fact, the last time Messi scored in two straight games was April 8 and 11 when he scored single tallies against Almeria and Sevilla. The last time Messi scored more than one goal in a game was on April 13 against Eibar.

In his last 10 games, Messi has six goals and four assists.

Meanwhile, Ronaldo has gone two straight games without a goal and has just one goal in his last four games. The last time Ronaldo scored a multi-goal game was his five-goal game against Granada back on April 5. He has only scored three goals overall since putting up that major record; he does have five assists in that run.

But worthy of note is that save for the five-goal effort and the two-goal turn against Schalke on March 10, Ronaldo has only scored a multi-goal game one other time in the year; a 3-0 win over Getafe on Jan. 18. While he is certainly producing a greater rate than earlier this year, Ronaldo has not proven to be as consistent an offensive force as the overall numbers would indicate.

In his last 10 games Ronaldo has 11 goals and six assists; five of those goals came in one game so Ronaldo has six goals over the nine remaining games.

Winner

This is a tough one to say the least. Both players were overshadowed by teammates but both were involved in team wins. One would have to give the slightest of edges to Ronaldo as he had an impact in both games and an exceptional one in the important game against Atletico Madrid. Messi scored a goal for Barcelona against Espanyol but was almost a non-factor against PSG. Ronaldo was a factor in both games he played.

The contest is now 14-14.

For the previous edition of this series, click here.