[QUOTE=âfarmerinthecity, post: 984753, member: 24â]Robben, Van Persie, Rodriguez and Neymar didnât 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 didnât 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 donât 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]
Van Persie definitely didnât, the others did
Knock out stages Farmer. Weâre leaving out group games sure messi scored the winning goal in all three of them. James was the only one of those four to score in the knock outs.
[QUOTE=âTabby, post: 984715, member: 2142â]Depends what all these lunatics are arguing though bandage?
If its that messi is not âa greatâ of the game, then he clearly is. Heâs 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 hasnât. 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 didnât. His demeanour also wasnât 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 and Esteban, do you not understand the rules of engagement. Excuses not allowed. Unless its Totti or Zlatan or any of the other band of characters heâs got a creepy man crush on.
You said that Van Persie didnât perform in important matches, as if that is some slight on him. When playing the World Champions in the group stages opening match, he helped to almost guaranteed qualification with a peach of a goal.
Thatâs not an excuse for Totti, itâs a fact. It was quite clearly not a dive and the fact that the official that did Koreaâs bidding was later
FIFA referee committee member Edgardo Codesal said television replays proved that Moreno, who has been branded public enemy No1 in Italy for expelling Totti, had blundered. Moreno had claimed there had been no contact with a Korean defender and that Totti had dived.
âTotti dived. I was 15-20 metres away. I had a very clear view. The right decision,â Moreno insisted.
But Codesal, who refereed the 1990 World Cup final, said television had proved Moreno wrong. âIf you freeze the screen you see contact between Totti and a Korean player,â said Codesal.
But he refused to criticise the Ecuadorian referee. âIt was a very difficult situation for the referee,â said Codesal. âAt the speed of the game today mistakes can happen. It is impossible to see everything.â
Codesal refuted Italian claims that Moreno had been part of a conspiracy to ensure Italy went out early from the tournament. âReferees are honest men and try to do their best. The idea is to try to be fair ⌠but mistakes always happen,â he said. âWe need to be more human with the referee.â
It was a dive mate. I was at the match, and had a few pints with the Italian team afterwards where Totti as much as admitted it. Granted my Italian wasnât great, at the time, but you could get the gist of what he was saying.
The ironic thing is lads on here justifying Missy not being a flop at the biggest stage of football because he had one contribution in 450 minutes of football. That might be alright for some lad who is a squad player at Everton but Missy is meant to be the best in the world, he is meant to be a talisman for his team but when the stakes got higher the shit seeped out of his butthole.
He contributed very little to Argentina in the World Cup knockout stages, he was the talisman of a star studded team and he really, really struggled to impact on the games for them never mind win them a World Cup. There is no bigger stage in football than the World Cup and Missy shit himself for the third time. A great would have dragged his country through almost single handedly, Missy barely impacted in the crunch games. Look at what Stoichkov and Baggio did for their nations in 94.
[QUOTE=âIl Bomber Destro, post: 984786, member: 2533â]The ironic thing is lads on here justifying Missy not being a flop at the biggest stage of football because he had one contribution in 450 minutes of football. That might be alright for some lad who is a squad player at Everton but Missy is meant to be the best in the world, he is meant to be a talisman for his team but when the stakes got higher the shit seeped out of his butthole.
He contributed very little to Argentina in the World Cup knockout stages, he was the talisman of a star studded team and he really, really struggled to impact on the games for them never mind win them a World Cup. There is no bigger stage in football than the World Cup and Missy shit himself for the third time. A great would have dragged his country through almost single handedly, Missy barely impacted in the crunch games. Look at what Stoichkov and Baggio did for their nations in 94.[/QUOTE]
Calling him Missy is something a ten year old would call childish
Rodriguez was taking the game to Brazil almost single handedly despite the referee giving Brazil carte blanche to kick him around the pitch. He kept plugging away until the final whistle, looking for the ball and taking the game to them. Given the context of the game and way it was officiated it was his most impressive game in the tournament.
Performances in the group stages are not to be scoffed at. Italy went home after the group stage in 2010 because they couldnât beat New Zealand and in 2014 because they lost to Costa Rica. The same fate also befell France in 2002 and Spain in the tournament just gone as defending champions.