I understand if you question Poch to bring a team to the top level. But I wouldn't belittle his achievement at Spurs just one good European run.
That's a term used by people who think the quality of a pass is independent of whether or not the recipient converts or misses the chances that emerged from it. Lunatics, I know.
Don't forget Mbappé, Bernat, Sergio Rico and Herrera. Hell, even Verratti, Donnarumma, Nuno Mendes, Marquinhos and Danilo...
Perhaps I should say "elite" manager. I'm not trying to belittle him, just to say that I don't see him as being as effective as Tuchel, Klopp and others. I'm not sure United missed the boat by not signing him up.
Too diificult to understand.
Go and troll in the proper thread
You say he HAD to go to one of the few clubs that could afford him? He didn't. He could lower his wage demands and have a wider selection of clubs to choose from, or he could retire. Nobody had a gun to his head making him go to Paris, he went for the money and is sure as shit not earning it right now.
Exactly.
I see your point, but just to add something about the PSG team. I think the PSG team is really overrated and it is a playstation team. TBH I think even Pep, Klopp and even SAF will struggle with that squad. Maybe SAF would have not signed Messi or sent out at least Mbappe to a different team. A team is about balance in several aspects of the game (offense, defense...) and balance in ego (you need players like Park, Fletcher when you have a Ronaldo).
Bebe
The true balanced view is short, isolated. Like all the other attackers regardless of who starts.
I'll troll wherever i damn well please, thank you very much
We all know what the excuse is. The current Ballon d'Or finally joined a top league and can't do it in a dry night in Lens.
Thanks, I've not seen any of them this season but I'd seen they were winning the league and Messi had scored or assisted every other game but had no other context to go on. So I guess from what you're saying PSG are struggling a bit despite their league position and he's not really managed to make an impact yet? And he's playing in the front-3? I'd half expected him to drop into a deeper role when he got older and become a Xavi/Iniesta hybrid. You'd think that'd work really well with Mbappe up top.
Xavi and Iniesta were work horses in their prime when they did not had the ball, Messi matches their ball skills and vision, but he never had work rate and defensive work rate which those two had, they never stopped running.
This is skewed because all of Messi's league assists were in 1 game.
Yeah, you could use Messi like a Riquelme but not below.
Funny, same thing happened to Ronaldo as well. Look at how many managers were fired when Ronaldo was with them. A lot more than Messi.
Yup, Messi is the closest we have what was classic number 10. But he would never be a central midfielder or midfield general like Xavi nor a dynamic attacking central midfielder like Iniesta.
But if no one else on PSG is playing all that well (and yes Messi needs to play much better) it is far more of a coaching issue.
He is not doing terrible but... I mean it would be really delusional to say he is doing good at the team. If his contribution just lingers around what he has been doing until now we would have to agree that it is a failure.
Ronaldo has just as many if not more major records.I didn't bring anything to youYou keep tagging me. Why do you care what I value more in terms of accomplishments?
Ronaldo will have his records and so will a lot of players. The major ones that matter most (down to votes or not) now belong to Messi, and he'll be happy with them.
Of course it's a coaching issue right now. Individually Messi is one of the best players in the world still, no doubt about that.
I more meant in terms of their primary role in the team rather than what they were expected to do defensively in that Barca team. Xavi was their key playmaker in the middle of the park and Iniesta was almost as good a short passer but could also carry the ball up the pitch to link defence with attack. In a team which presumably dominates most games they play in Messi should fit in as a primary playmaker in the centre of the park. Plenty of teams have been successful playing a creative midfielder as the furthest forward in the 3 without expecting them to do a massive amount defensively - Pogba for France would be a good example. At the top level it's probably not a winning strategy unless you have Kante, but in the French league it should be feasible. If you have access to Messi surely the thing to do is to get him on the ball as much as possible.
Pogba wouldn't be a good example, he does a normal job defensively for France. And the french league isn't an amateur league, you have great athletes and lots of young talented players that will dominate your midfield physically and technically if you let them.
Sounds like a next straw clutching phrase Messi fanboys are going to use. ‘Assists that didn’t get in’ -
Agreed. Right now it feels like Messi was a luxury signing.
Meaning key passes, something some of the cr7 50cents army will have no clue on. Should I use a smiley too?Sounds like a next straw clutching Messi fanboys are going to use. ‘Assists that didn’t get in’ -
Fair enough, happy to cede to those with more knowledge. Whenever I've seen Pogba for France he's done relatively little defensive work, especially compared to whoever he's been in there with, but it's a small sample size and I suppose I haven't regularly seen Messi over the last few years to say whether he's capable of that.
You can play Messi as a 10 with two CMs/DMs that will put an emphasis on defending. But that's different from what we generally understand by a midfield 3, in that case the three midfielders are in charge of covering , you can't have a player that has no defensive awareness and doesn't have the athletic abilities to compensate for it in that kind of role. You mentioned Iniesta/Xavi as examples and both played their entire careers in those roles, they had the attitude, defensive awareness and positioning of center midfielders, Messi doesn't.
You should spend more time on other threads, or even outside.
Yeah, again, I mentioned them in the context of their attributes on the ball and what they offered offensively. And I'd argue the difference between being the most advanced of a midfield three and being an attacking midfielder in front of a midfield two is largely semantic these days. What I mean is I'd have him centrally (but yes, further forward than the other midfielders) getting on the ball in the build-up, making forward passes and carrying the ball up the pitch rather than sitting out of the wing.
Both are correct statement.
Pep and Enrique are the only manager to put Messi in a good spot to succeed and we all saw what happen difference is Messi was on a handicap in terms of coaches compared to Ronaldo. Why can't they seem to help Portugal? Because at club level there coached by Pep who helps them adapt while bring the best out of them, while international there coached by a dinosaur. No matter how good players are managers make a big difference also, even for players like Messi and Ronaldo.