10 - Lionel Messi - v4

[serghei]

Exactly this.

Once again, he made it happen and won us the trophy.

Te Amo D10S !!!!


PS : That's not taking anything from the team's performance, amazing that we won after Masche send off early on, 10/10 to everyone bar Neymar (I'll give him a 7+) and Rafinha (pretty much inexistant) for me.

Same can be said about half our team. Messi was not better than Ter Stegen, Pique or Iniesta for example.

Some of you are trying to turn this into a game won "singlehandedly" by Messi and it's not fair. It's really not what happened. In fact, most of the spanish press praised our ability to act as a team, and didn't describe our win as the work of a saviour.

 

[Vlom]

Same can be said about half our team. Messi was not better than Ter Stegen, Pique or Iniesta for example.

Some of you are trying to turn this into a game won "singlehandedly" by Messi and it's not fair. It's really not what happened. In fact, most of the spanish press praised our ability to act as a team, and didn't describe our win as the work of a saviour.

Well thank god I put in the PS in there saying that I'm not taking anything from the entire team's performance that was immense.

But again, all of that would have been in vain if we can't create occasions and score, and the 3 occasions he created (red card + 2 goals) were unvaluable.

Messi Iniesta and Piqué were definitely above the rest of the team, so yeah you can say 10/10 for everyone, 12/10 for those 3.

 

[Total-Football]

He did great, but......but my God do I miss that agility and acceleration. I don't get that feeling every time he gets the ball.

problem is he still has it .. he still quick and agile and he showed that in the first half .. he did 1 or 2 ridiculous accélérations where he just outrun sevilla players .. difference is that nowdays he holds back and can't do it constantly and he knows that, raw vintage messi was not giving a fuck , he was doing it the whole match

 

[Stric]

Same can be said about half our team. Messi was not better than Ter Stegen, Pique or Iniesta for example.

Some of you are trying to turn this into a game won "singlehandedly" by Messi and it's not fair. It's really not what happened. In fact, most of the spanish press praised our ability to act as a team, and didn't describe our win as the work of a saviour.

That's true, but if Messi hadn't made those two decisions and executed them the way he did, there's nothing to suggest we would have won this. We played the full 90 minutes and were no closer to the title than Sevilla. So yes, the entire team eventually made it happen, but it would be unfair not to point out that in the crucial moment Messi's move put us ahead.

 

[serghei]

By this logic, if Neymar's quick feet wouldn't have obtained that red for Banega, chances are Sevilla would have capitalized on their 11 vs 10 advantage and beat us. If Stegen wouldn't have saved that free kick we would have probably lost as well. Every big moment is valuable and can tilt the game in your favor, no matter who creates that moment.

Messi and Alba's move put us ahead, that wasn't at all an easy finish to hit it first time like that. The finish was just as important as the pass.

Did Messi single handedly deny us a chance to make the CL double when he missed that penalty vs Chelsea?

 

[ThwiX]

Why with open eyes tho?

Probably a bit awkward when everybody is taking a photo of you. It's not something I have seen them do often in public.

 

[Total-Football]

[MENTION=15262]serghei[/MENTION] good luck explaining that to them..to them only what messi is doing matters . Alba constantly going full speed from our corner to the opponent's corner doesnt matter.. that effort doesnt mean shit , only the diagonal pass matters

anyway dont wanna dwell on that .. the season is over with a happy ending, and messi definitely was pivotal to our sucess, like always.

 

[footyfan]

That's true, but if Messi hadn't made those two decisions and executed them the way he did, there's nothing to suggest we would have won this. We played the full 90 minutes and were no closer to the title than Sevilla. So yes, the entire team eventually made it happen, but it would be unfair not to point out that in the crucial moment Messi's move put us ahead.

The crucial moment was not just Messi's assist though. If Pique hadn't kept Barca in the game, Messi would not even have had the chance to influence the outcome. If Iniesta didn't defend so well in midfield and relieve pressure on the ball, the team might have collapsed way before extra time even rolled in.

So while Messi's assists were significant (and gorgeous), he wasn't the most significant player (definitely top 3 though). And I would again reiterate that there were many crucial moments before Messi's assists.

And that's not even mentioning Alba's finish from a ridiculous angle with the ball on the bounce.

 

[Ritchie]

Same can be said about half our team. Messi was not better than Ter Stegen, Pique or Iniesta for example.

Some of you are trying to turn this into a game won "singlehandedly" by Messi and it's not fair. It's really not what happened. In fact, most of the spanish press praised our ability to act as a team, and didn't describe our win as the work of a saviour.

Without Messi we wouldn't score because there's nobody else to create much in the way of chances. Messi puts them on a plate game after game.

Maybe we'd have won on pens after 0-0 but that's a 50/50 lottery without Messi's intervention.

 

[Hardy]

don't like this evolution of Messi or better to say, don't like see him finish a game basically whitout a single shot on target except the freekicks and this thing now is becoming to frequent but i don't blame him, is more a team's problem. But if this is the evolution of his play we absolutely need more fast and direct players to attack the space and capitalize his amazing vision, Neymar, Alba and maybe Suarez are the only greats counter-attackers we have right now.

 

[SocalBarcaFan]

It is becoming more and more apparent that Messi is mainly looking to set up his teammates to score rather than him putting the ball into the net

So going forward what is the best way to enhance his amazing vision in a midfield role while still remaining defensively sound? Cause we all know Messi won't track back enough on defense. So just say you take Messi out of his RW spot and put him in midfield with the way the team is currently constructed. You'd prob put Rakitic in with Busquets because they are the most responsible defensive midfielders we have. I don't know how well it would work going forward, but would playing Arda at RW be a good option with that midfield setup? When the other team has possession he would definitely put in work to get the ball back.

I think if Messi is truly going to become a midfielder going forward we either need to get another player this summer or change for the 4-3-3. I know the latter will probably never happen but I'm just curious to see how Barca and Mess's future unfolds.

 

[6 Ballons for Messi]

I think barca needs another world class defensive minded midfielder to play along busi, so that messi will have the freedom to do things in midfield.
Verratti with busi makes me drool.

 

[Messi983]

I don't think Messi will ever play fulltime as a true CM in 4-3-3. Of course he can move there for some minutes during the game and he already do that but I don't expect us to start him there instead of another midfielder. He just doesn't do enough defensively. We can get away with that now that there are 3 midfielders to cover for him but we would be exploited if he'd be one of those midfielders. I think if he wants to stay more concentrated on creating than scoring as it seems (and I believe he really enjoys in this role and he's not just there because of our incapable midfielders as some people think) we should play him as AMC in either 4-2-3-1 or 4-1-2-1-2. In first formation we'd probably start Busq-Raki and there wouldn't be guaranteed place in first XI for Iniesta anymore and we'd have to play one of Arda/Rafinha or maybe Denis as RW. Second is similar to what we play now, just with both Messi and Neymar moving more centrally. In that case we'd need to have more support from our fullbacks. It won't work against any team but there are certainly games where we could play that way.

I don't think either of those systems are optimal for the team we currently have but we can try some things out during preseason and maybe also next season against some worse opponents. Lucho will be in his third season and that's when Pep started to experience with 3-4-3 as his reserve formation if I remember correctly. I think Lucho should continue to develop as a coach and get his backup formation/plan B or whatever we name that to use it if neccessary when things are not working as we'd like or if we have injuries. We have a lot of players who are able to play on different positions and we should use that to our advantage.

I won't look more into the future because we don't know how team will look in 2 or 3 years or who our coach will be so there would be too much guessing. But I stay with my first sentence that it's very unlikely we'll ever see Messi as our starting CM in whichever system we'll play.

 

[El Flaco]

I do not want to hate on Messi btw. His assist was amazing and he was present in a decisive moment (as always) but I hate the fact that he gets praised more for one pass than other teammates for keeping such a game open for more than 90 minutes.

It's not easy to create something when he get very harsh tackles every time when the Argentine had the ball. The few times when he wasn't tackled, Messi manage to skip past a couple of players and caused problems for Sevilla's defece. We were also quite poor during the 1st half Sevilla had much of the possession. We can't expect that Messi should score 3 goals, 2 assists, manage to run 13 km and save the earth from the global warming to make people happy? As you said by yourself, he was present in a decisive moments. Not many players can do passes like the one Messi did to Alba's goal.

 

[Blaugrana Bull]

You are completely missing the point but whatever. I am glad some realized what I was talking about. serghei or footyfan e.g.