10 - Lionel Messi - v4

[te amo barca]

Messi's biggest strength in dribbling is not even his pace, it is his balance - the ability to stay on feet after performing a feint/dummy combining it with ridiculous agility. And Messi's dribbling ability is, by far, the best because it's the most effective. Performing a feint will always be more efficient than a trick because a feint exploits physical flaws of the defenders - they are too big, too slow, too strong, etc.

 

[StarLord]

That Iniesta highlights reel partly explains why Iniesta has been superior to Zidane. His combination of consistency and artistry was never matched by ZZ. Can anyone find a highlights combination of ZZ pulling off so many great moves time and time again?

 

[Ekul]

Messi's touch isn't 'historically great'...

On the topic of dribbling though, I think a good burst of pace is a hugely underrated factor. Just look at last season, Messi was by no means slow but he clearly wasn't 100% and he looked a bit more sluggish and... human. He could still take players on, it's not like he'd lost his dribbling ability, but he was struggling to burst away from defenders after completely dribbles so he'd then have to take them on again. People call Iniesta slow, but he has always had (not so much now, but in his prime) great acceleration and a turn of pace, similar to Cruyff and Laudrup, allowing him to get away from players after completing a dribble.For me, dribbling is either taking someone on with great close control and then accelerating away from them, or aggressively darting in to spaces with the ball (something that Neymar specialises in).

I, like some others, think that Iniesta's style of dribbling is more aesthetically pleasing, but Messi is on another level for me. And it isn't because Iniesta is 'slow', as I don't think that is the case. I'd say that Iniesta is the best human dribbler in the world, though.

 

[raskolnikov]

That Iniesta highlights reel partly explains why Iniesta has been superior to Zidane. His combination of consistency and artistry was never matched by ZZ. Can anyone find a highlights combination of ZZ pulling off so many great moves time and time again?

What I Always liked about Zidane was that his pressence alone made the team play much better, like Modric with current Real or prime Xavi for us.
He is similair to Iniesta when it comes to being a big game player, but he also dissapeared and played subpar in plenty of smaller games which gets overlooked now.
Zidane at his very best (around 2000) was really good to watch when he was on his level but he does get overrated nowadays.

Iniesta will get underrated due to his stats, people in the future will only look at that, I even recently had a discussion with a guy who was convinced David Silva Always been better than Iniesta cause he gave more assists and Iniesta was just Lucky to play at Barca and therefore was a starter for Spain.
Iniesta is one of those guys you need to have seen live to appreciate his greatness, imagine if there was no YouTube and compilation vids.

 

[Vegeta]

So out of 100, maybe I would say the difference between Prime Messi and Iniesta was this.

Dribbling: Messi 100, Iniesta 98

Ball Control: Messi 99, Iniesta 100

Overall Technique: Messi 100, Iniesta 100

First Touch: Messi 97, Iniesta 98

Obviously Messi is way better at shooting, the final ball, and is far more consistent with all of his skills and abilities. He's now also better at being a tempo controller than Prime Iniesta.

I love Iniesta so much, he was my favorite player in the world. But he is not 'better' than Messi, not even in dribbling in his prime, because he didn't do it as consistently as Messi. Maybe he had the 'same' level, or ability, or pure dribbling technique, but part of Messi's genius is how he pulls it off over, and over, and over, and over again.

Remember, Iniesta is the Illusionista. He creates the illusions that he is better than fucking everyone when he is pulling off pure art like that. Sometimes you even forget he has the best player in the world next to him.

 

[StarLord]

I even recently had a discussion with a guy who was convinced David Silva Always been better than Iniesta cause he gave more assists and Iniesta was just Lucky to play at Barca and therefore was a starter for Spain.

Premface alert. I am sure that guy thought that James Milner was better than D.Silva when the latter played for Valencia in the sunny SPL.

 

[Ekul]

So out of 100, maybe I would say the difference between Prime Messi and Iniesta was this.

Dribbling: Messi 100, Iniesta 98

Ball Control: Messi 99, Iniesta 100

Overall Technique: Messi 100, Iniesta 100

First Touch: Messi 97, Iniesta 98

Obviously Messi is way better at shooting, the final ball, and is far more consistent with all of his skills and abilities. He's now also better at being a tempo controller than Prime Iniesta.

I love Iniesta so much, he was my favorite player in the world. But he is not 'better' than Messi, not even in dribbling in his prime, because he didn't do it as consistently as Messi. Maybe he had the 'same' level, or ability, or pure dribbling technique, but part of Messi's genius is how he pulls it off over, and over, and over, and over again.

Remember, Iniesta is the Illusionista. He creates the illusions that he is better than fucking everyone when he is pulling off pure art like that. Sometimes you even forget he has the best player in the world next to him.

I don't think Iniesta is better than Messi at any of those 4 things, and that's no disrespect to him. I think that people often underrate some of Messi's abilities when compared to other players, because they assume that someone else's standout quality must be better than Leo's 5th or 6th best attribute. For example, I've recently seen someone say that Pirlo is a better passer than Messi.

 

[raskolnikov]

Premface alert. I am sure that guy thought that James Milner was better than D.Silva when the latter played for Valencia in the sunny SPL.

Yeah also the standard Barca used Cesc wrong and Messi wouldnt do it at stoke stuff. Its so tiresome and dragged out as the old he cant perform without Xavi and Iniesta argument. I usually dont even get into the discussion anymore.

 

[Qqqq]

"I've never seen something like that in a 16 years old kid. At the end of the match I went to tell Rikjaard that they already had three foreign players, to get a loan on him. He told me they were already working on that and he would be playing for them in a couple months. I asked Juventus to sing him, but he wasn't available as Barcelona didn't want to sell him. During half time most of our players were talking about how good and fast he was" - Fabio Capello.

Watching this, it was pretty apparent that he was gonna turn out to be something very, very special. By far the most dangerous player on the field at what, 17?

 

[raskolnikov]

Watching this, it was pretty apparent that he was gonna turn out to be something very, very special. By far the most dangerous player on the field at what, 17?

Owning Vieira, look how they were going at him by the way. He got kicked like it was a cl final.

Back then I thought Messi would be to weak to be a pro. He may look talented but they would just walk all over him and injure him constantly.
Thought Robinho was the one who would make it back when Real bought him as an answer to Messi.
A friend of mine still brings that up every know and then. I'm happy I was so wrong though

 

[draconifire]

http://www.espnfcasia.com/spanish-copa-del-rey/80/video/2479343/espn-sport-science-messis-magic
The last bit was just astonishing, i mean wow. He is a freak of nature.

 

[LordLichtenstein]

http://www.espnfcasia.com/spanish-copa-del-rey/80/video/2479343/espn-sport-science-messis-magic
The last bit was just astonishing, i mean wow. He is a freak of nature.

Fuck me. That was fucking awesome !

 

[Vegeta]

I don't think Iniesta is better than Messi at any of those 4 things, and that's no disrespect to him. I think that people often underrate some of Messi's abilities when compared to other players, because they assume that someone else's standout quality must be better than Leo's 5th or 6th best attribute. For example, I've recently seen someone say that Pirlo is a better passer than Messi.

You may be right. Their style of dribbling is simply different. Comparing apples of different colors, I suppose.

But even saying that one has a 100 in dribbling vs. 98, what does that even mean? I don't even know. I think what I wrote is a possible method of differentiation but ultimately a vacuous, and invalid, one.

 

[Antimadridista1]

Huge game for him tomorrow... He wasn't as good as he wanted to be in the final against Germany in 2014 and he'll make sure to rectify that tomorrow.

Making history once again tomorrow, I can feel it.

 

[Kerrybai]

When pressured by 3 guys I Always felt safer with Iniesta than Messi, not a knock on him of course since he is probably the only one who can do it better.

Its not a fair comparison, Messi generally loses the ball further up the pitch than Iniesta. Iniesta plays deeper so of course he will lose the ball less and he will have more space to escape with the ball. The comparsion really doesn't make much sense.

The 2 examples you pointed out at 4.59 and 5.32... what did Iniesta do with the ball in the end? He made a pass out into space. If Messi could do that all the time he wouldn't lose the ball as much either, but Messi's focus is to make a dangerous play forward as that's his prime role. He can't play it safe and rotate as often as Iniesta. Unless they switch roles we really can't compare.