Messi left Argentina when he was 13,
I wonder if leaving Argentina at such an early age somehow left him lacking a little passion or something when it come to playing for his country.
If he had opted to play for Spain, though…
1 Like
Although tbh, with a little bit of luck in that 2014 final going the other way we probably wouldn’t be having that discussion
3 Likes
I think the 86 team is often very underrated, and the strength of the Argentina sides Messi played on often over stated.
With the exception of the 2006 side that narrowly lost to an emerging germany, one in which Messi had not yet established himself, every side he has played on has either being critically unbalanced or managed by a lunatic. Having enough attacking talent that you can ignore Icardi and leave Aguero on the bench provides a mirage of strength if at the other end your best defender is Rojo or your midfield is filled with tier B journeymen.
4 Likes
Zabaletta, Zanetti, Mascherano, Ayala, Heinze, Veron, Ortega, Banega, Gago, Di Maria, Aimar, Higuain, Crespo, Rodriguez…Messi’s had way more talented players around him than Maradona ever had playing for Argentina.
2 Likes
Some of the things written about Messi here have me scratching my head to be honest.
He’s a ridiculous footballer. Over 700 goals for Barcelona and Argentina. Goals against proper opposition, not farmers and military teams like Pele and Romario et al like to include.
He’s the most gifted footballer I’ve seen play. Not as fun to watch as Ronaldinho, he’s a lot more robotic and predictable, but the most gifted without a doubt. I’ve never seen a footballer with such good decision making, never mind his impeccable finishing, passing or dribbling ability.
The things said and written about him after our 4-0 win says it all about the impossible standard he’s held to. He battered us in Barca, was their best player on the night at Anfield and created numerous opportunities that others failed to score yet was still lambasted by the media and football fans in general.
He’s becoming a victim of his own success.
15 Likes
Another thing he has in common with late Maradona… That’s the problem with the modern world, you can’t give praise nowadays to a footballer or a manager without completely dismissing or belittling some of his rivals or colleagues who have been compared to him. I wish I could have watched Maradona at his best, maybe then I would be able to make a fair comparison but regardless, it shouldn’t be hard to accept that both are rightfully considered the best of all time. Man, would I be proud of both if I was Argentinian…
7 Likes
What always scrambles my brain is how average Messi is at taking penalties. He scores less than 8 out of 10 (78.7%). For reference Maradona scored 94.2% of his, which is particularly high. Cristiano Ronaldo is at 83.33%. James Milner’s at 85.7%. The average in the Premier League between 2014 and 2019 was 77.3% (358/463).
1 Like
That is just a collection of players, some of whom aren’t particularly good and would have struggled to get into an England team of the time. They also span a wide enough time span that you could never claim that this was a team. Some of them are old enough to have never played in a world cup team that Messi was the figure head of (i.e. past 2006) and at least 1 never played in a world cup with him at all.
More to the point though is does’nt really address my point. Yes, Argentina have always had talented players to call upon. But so have England and how has that worked? For most of Messi’s international career that quality has been an over abundance of good attacking players and considerable weaknesses throughout the rest of the side. On occasions when they have the collection of players to put out a strong and well balanced side they’ve fucked it up with their managerial appointments, most notably Diego in 2008-2010. His lack of giving a shit about things like tactics or shape ruined the chances of what was possibly the most complete group of players Messi got to play with. By the time you get to 2014, they had gone a full 180 with Spalleti and and left them playing a side that was essentially a (fat and unreliable) striker, Messi, and then a midfield of workers behind him seemingly picked to protect a slow CB pairing. Man for man it was not an impressive side and other than Messi and Masch didnt have too many players you’d want playing for Liverpool. Yet they were still a fat man’s sitter away from winning the world cup. Would Diego have been a worse player had Burrachaga shat himself on his break away instead of scoring?
4 Likes
Couldn’t agree more.
Why not just enjoy and remember Maradona as the magical player he was, particularly on this RIP thread, nothing can take that away from him anyway.
6 Likes
Of course it’s just a collection of players. A better collection than those Maradona played with, that was the point. Not sure the relevance of comparing them to the England team. Maradona didn’t get to play with them either, other than in the sense of toying with them.
It’s difficult to describe Messi’s performances for Argentina as being in the same league as those of Maradona though. He’s just rarely lit it up in the same way that Maradona consistently did.
1 Like
The point being that simply pointing to players you think are good doesn’t address the issue of what sort of team you can put out with them that has some semblance of balance and without significant weaknesses. I mean who looks at a side with Rojo and Demichalis in their back line and thinks “you know what lads, we’re going win this bastard.”
You also skipped over the fact that several of them had almost no significant overlap with his international career, notably the ones who if they did might have actually given Messi’s teams the balance it needed (Zanetti and Ayala).
It was a statement about them not being good enough to have played for us. I think that was pretty unambiguous in the comment. If your choice of players used to illustrate to how talented his teams were are in fact pretty run of the mill guys who would not have been picked for England, players like Gago and Ortega (one to those who was too old to have crossed paths with messi), then it isnt much an argument.
2 Likes
You’re quite right, not sure why I thought they’d overlapped.
But it was you that described the likes of Mascherano, Veron, Rodriguez, Pastore, Di Maria (the Argentina midfield at the 2010 World Cup) as constituting “tier B journeymen”.
I don’t think that’s a fair assessment at all.
1 Like
1 Like
“Objection, your honour”
“Sustained.”
You are correct that would not be a fair point because it is not remotely the one I made. What I, very clearly, said is that despite having talented players available there were typically not enough to go around and so while there were often excellent attacking players on the bench or overlooked entirely, throughout the rest of the side they had to rely on not particularly impressive players. Man for man, in his time, they have typically been more Croatia like in terms of depth of talent than Brazil or Germany.
You will also note, or at least you should, that I explicitly called out the 2010 side as being probably the peak of his career in terms of talent, they just happened to be led by a coach who killed his own team with a lack of consideration on shape and tactics. The clear implication is that a team that was massively exposed when it didn’t have the ball is nothing that should reasonably be put at Messi’s feet for under performing.
2 Likes
This is what you said,
It seemed to me that other than 2006 you were saying that Messi had to make do with an abundance of attacking talent but this only provided a mirage of strength “if at the other end your best defender is Rojo or your midfield is filled with tier B journeymen”. Other than 2006 the only world cup Rojo didn’t play with Messi in was 2010, hence my inference that you were describing the 2010 midfield cohort as constituting “tier B journeymen”.
I think it’s also a bit unfair to describe Argentina as equivalent to Croatia in terms of their depth of talent during Messi’s international career. When Messi made his debut for Argentina they were ranked 4th in the world. In the course of his international career they’ve ended the year ranked number 1 in the world twice (2007 and 2016), and finished the year ranked in the top 10 in 15 out of 16 years and in the top 5 in 10 out of 16 years.
That’s comparable to Brazil (top 5 in 11 out of 16 years), number 1 in the world twice (2005 and 2006), and Germany (top 5 in 10 out of 16 years), number 1 in the world twice (2014 and 2017).
Whereas Croatia have only once finished in the top 5 in the world in that period (2018), when they achieved their highest ever ranking of 4th. A ranking Argentina have equaled or exceeded in 9 out of the last 16 years.
Why do you say the 1986 team was underrated? Other than Maradona, who do you think on that team would have got into any of the world cup squads Messi has played with?
1 Like
Stop lawyering.
The pattern of Messi’s career is he broke through at a time when Aregntina was a hot bed of talent, such that the best side he played man for man was 2006, but he was only a bit part player at that time. They still had talent in 2010, but their failures there would be covered by the “or managed by a lunatic”. If that was unclear from that first post alone, the subsequent discussion very clearly clarified that.
Since then the talent pool has seriously dried up and they have failed repeatedly in the youth level tournaments they had previously taken massive pride in. As such, the next generation of players broke through after 2010 did so with expectations based on what people expected of Argentinian players rather than based on how good they actually were. As such you get players like Gago who people might assume is good based on the name recognition of going to Real at a young age, but he’s a Europe League level player…a tier B journeyman (in the context of the discussion). As such, since the 2010 world cup their side has indeed been filled out by players of this standard. As a result, since then man for man, they have been more comparable to the likes of Croatia than the likes of Brazil, Spain and Germany. The fact they have sustained such good FIFA ratings despite that is a mark over overachievement.
2 Likes
Fun fact:
When Maradona made his debut for Newell’s, Messi was 6 years old and was doing keepie-uppies in the centre circle during half time of that game.
3 Likes
Cambiasso.
1 Like
Good footballer but a revolting little fucker.
3 Likes