It's amazing how much NT success/failure is so make or break for a player's career.
I just hate that bc of this now, he will never be universally recognized as the GOAT. The haters will cling to this day for the rest of their miserable lives now and it really is a shame if it ends like this. I do thin it's a bit rash but considering all he's gone through with Argentina recently, I really don't blame him. Their fans and the AFA don't deserve him, especially with shit like not having flights scheduled on time, bad coach selections which led to poor player selections (anyone remember that circus that was Maradona coaching for the WC 2010?) and feeling no remorse for scapegoating the player who is literally dragging the team to finals in almost every major tournament he's played for them.
To sum up my feelings about this, the biggest bullshit about all of this is that Messi gets criticized for not finishing the job when his team around him fails him while Ronaldo skates by and gets the loudest of praises when he merely performs to his standard (something he RARELY does with Portugal) when it's the team around him that busts their asses just to give him chances for him to blast or fuck up. The double standard between them is a joke sometimes and while Portugal's players, even though most of them aren't world class, actually overachieve to make up for Ronaldo's conceded, can't track back or pass bougie ass while outside of Mascherano and maybe di Maria, the Argentina players shit on Messi when he literally creates everything for them. It's like Argentina players don't give a shit about their or Messi's legacy while Portugal players give everything for Ronaldo to succeed.
