Deflection thread

Didn’t Totti get the line for diving in a world cup knockout game as well?

A corrupt official wrongly sent him off which was proven on video evidence. Moreno knew that Totti was the man who would lead Italy to glory as any time Totti has been available Italy made it to the final.

[QUOTE=“Dirty Hands Walter, post: 984615, member: 9”]Who wrote that shit article that @Mark Renton posted?

Messi was crap but he was marked heavily so that means he was actually great seems to be the tenet of the bizarre argument.

The lad was useless. Time to move on.[/QUOTE]
Depends what all these lunatics are arguing though bandage?
If its that messi is not ‘a great’ of the game, then he clearly is. He’s considered one by almost all of the respected figures within the game and his performances over a sustained period of time clearly show he deserves this title. Everyone knows it even the bauld bomber.
If its did he show he was the greatest ever at the business end of this World Cup then clearly he hasn’t. He needed to do that to be compared to Maradona and Pele (and only those two) as he is already at least equal to or better than anyone else.
As I said before though he is clearly well below his best all season but even at that scored a shed load of goals for Barca and caused top teams like Switzerland Holland and Germany to alter their whole game plan to stop him after he won 4 man of the match awards in a row (games in which he was almost as poor as he was in the last 3 but still managed to come up with the decisive moments) and this in a tournament where all attackers struggled in the knock out stages. Robben, Van Persie, Rodriguez, Higuain, Neymar, Benzema etc etc were all pretty ineffective for the most important games. He was also playing on a team where all his attacking colleagues were horribly out of form or unfit. Still though Messi is held to a higher standard so still should have found a way but didn’t. His demeanour also wasn’t great and he lacked leadership qualities and always will.
In short he IS a great of the game, the greatest currently playing, the greatest of the modern era, but NOT the greatest of all time. Yet.

[QUOTE=“Tabby, post: 984715, member: 2142”]Depends what all these lunatics are arguing though bandage?
If its that messi is not ‘a great’ of the game, then he clearly is. He’s considered one by almost all of the respected figures within the game and his performances over a sustained period of time clearly show he deserves this title. Everyone knows it even the bauld bomber.
If its did he show he was the greatest ever at the business end of this World Cup then clearly he hasn’t. He needed to do that to be compared to Maradona and Pele (and only those two) as he is already at least equal to or better than anyone else.
As I said before though he is clearly well below his best all season but even at that scored a shed load of goals for Barca and caused top teams like Switzerland Holland and Germany to alter their whole game plan to stop him after he won 4 man of the match awards in a row (games in which he was almost as poor as he was in the last 3 but still managed to come up with the decisive moments) and this in a tournament where all attackers struggled in the knock out stages. Robben, Van Persie, Rodriguez, Higuain, Neymar, Benzema etc etc were all pretty ineffective for the most important games. He was also playing on a team where all his attacking colleagues were horribly out of form or unfit. Still though Messi is held to a higher standard so still should have found a way but didn’t. His demeanour also wasn’t great and he lacked leadership qualities and always will.
In short he IS a great of the game, the greatest currently playing, the greatest of the modern era, but NOT the greatest of all time. Yet.[/QUOTE]

utter garbage, he is a drug riddled fud that has failed his country time after time, he was carried by xavi at barca too and now xavi has faded missy is shit- fact

How dare you!

Xavi was nothing before Messi came along

[QUOTE=“Tabby, post: 984715, member: 2142”]Depends what all these lunatics are arguing though bandage?
If its that messi is not ‘a great’ of the game, then he clearly is. He’s considered one by almost all of the respected figures within the game and his performances over a sustained period of time clearly show he deserves this title. Everyone knows it even the bauld bomber.
If its did he show he was the greatest ever at the business end of this World Cup then clearly he hasn’t. He needed to do that to be compared to Maradona and Pele (and only those two) as he is already at least equal to or better than anyone else.
As I said before though he is clearly well below his best all season but even at that scored a shed load of goals for Barca and caused top teams like Switzerland Holland and Germany to alter their whole game plan to stop him after he won 4 man of the match awards in a row (games in which he was almost as poor as he was in the last 3 but still managed to come up with the decisive moments) and this in a tournament where all attackers struggled in the knock out stages. Robben, Van Persie, Rodriguez, Higuain, Neymar, Benzema etc etc were all pretty ineffective for the most important games. He was also playing on a team where all his attacking colleagues were horribly out of form or unfit. Still though Messi is held to a higher standard so still should have found a way but didn’t. His demeanour also wasn’t great and he lacked leadership qualities and always will.
In short he IS a great of the game, the greatest currently playing, the greatest of the modern era, but NOT the greatest of all time. Yet.[/QUOTE]

He flopped, stop making excuses.

Well applying the criteria that’s applied to Messi, the inescapable conclusion is that Zlatan is utterly shit. Zlatan has never scored in a World Cup Finals match. He’s never won the European Cup despite playing for Ajax, Barcelona, Inter, AC & Juventus, 5 clubs with a combined haul of 20 European Cups between them. Inter & Barcelona both even managed to European Cup in 2010 & 11 the season after they moved Zlatan on.

Or Guardiola and his PED football.

Ya just like Nadal

so true

mate, i told you before, stats mean nothing on this site

There’s no concrete basis to suggest Nadal juices. Guardiola has failed doping tests, Messi was fed with PEDs as a kid by Barcelona and Barcelona have links with Fuentes.

That’s a pretty serious allegation you’re making - that Messi was effectively cheated out of a World Cup winners medal by a German team backboned by Bayern Munich players who their manager Guardiola had on the juice.

Missy has been a cheat all his life.

A rare lost argument for bomber on the internet. Bringing zlatan and totti into it was a mistake. Like messi though he’ll be back.

calling him Missy isn’t big or clever and isn’t half as glib as you think it is…

for instance I could call totti - titty and it wouldn’t add any weight to my argument that while I thought he was handy player he isn’t even in the same stratosphere as King Lio

Robben, Van Persie, Rodriguez and Neymar didn’t perform in the important matches? You have to be kidding.

I agree with most of the rest of it though, particularly on the attitude and leadership points. His attitude is pretty stinking to be honest. He didn’t look like he wanted to be there last Sunday and tend to gets like that for Barcelona as well when he is crowded out. Yet somehow his attitude is always lauded by commentators particularly in comparison to Ronaldo.

A leader would have grabbed some of those matches by the scruff of the net. Like Maradona did (I am led to believe) versus England, Belgium and Germany in 1986. Like Zidane did against Brazil in 2006, or England in Euro 2004. He showed signs of doing it earlier in the tournament but seemed to lose heart. Dare I say it, he is pretty one dimensional as well - incredible with regard to that one dimension but one dimensional nonetheless.

We have to remember as well that he has spent his whole football life at Barcelona. I genuinely would wonder what he would be like if he left (we see glimpses of this with Argentina). I don’t think he is the most confident person and I would doubt whether he would be as good elsewhere as Barcelona is what he knows.

The best player in the world currently for me of course but not yet the Greatest of All Time.

[QUOTE=“farmerinthecity, post: 984753, member: 24”]Robben, Van Persie, Rodriguez and Neymar didn’t perform in the important matches? You have to be kidding.

I agree with most of the rest of it though, particularly on the attitude and leadership points. His attitude is pretty stinking to be honest. He didn’t look like he wanted to be there last Sunday and tend to gets like that for Barcelona as well when he is crowded out. Yet somehow his attitude is always lauded by commentators particularly in comparison to Ronaldo.

A leader would have grabbed some of those matches by the scruff of the net. Like Maradona did (I am led to believe) versus England, Belgium and Germany in 1986. Like Zidane did against Brazil in 2006, or England in Euro 2004. He showed signs of doing it earlier in the tournament but seemed to lose heart. Dare I say it, he is pretty one dimensional as well - incredible with regard to that one dimension but one dimensional nonetheless.

We have to remember as well that he has spent his whole football life at Barcelona. I genuinely would wonder what he would be like if he left (we see glimpses of this with Argentina). I don’t think he is the most confident player and I would doubt whether he would be as good elsewhere as Barcelona is what he knows.

The best player in the world currently for me of course but not yet an All Time Great.[/QUOTE[/QUOTE]

Neymar was anonymous enough in his two knock out games, Van P did nothing at all in the knock out stages robben and Rodriguez were both good in the earlier knock out games but didnt produce in their teams biggest hour of need. Just saying Messi deserves to be held to a higher standard but he did still produce flashes of brilliance in every game and wasn’t much worse if at all than those lads.

I wonder could Messi take a year off to go travelling in Australia like Jamie Clarke or one of them to rediscover his ‘hunger’.