Messi is undisputedly the No.1 footballer of all time. The reasons are very obvious. He is widely regarded as the greatest footballer of all time and known for his ball control, dribbling, finishing and other football skills. He has been dominating football for almost two decades now and he still continues to do the same.
Football is the king of sports, the oldest and most popular sport in the world. But it never delivers perfect narratives. It just shocks people at times with incredible results and that’s how it comes out even more impactful.
At the age of 35, Lionel Messi didn’t escape from winning people’s hearts over. Once again, he won everyone over by lifting the gold World Cup trophy at Lusail Stadium in Qatar on December 18, 2022. He has finally won the World Cup for Argentina after confirming that FIFA World Cup 2022 is his last World Cup.
This is the third time Argentina has won the World Cup in its history with Messi beating 2018 World Cup champion France in the final. Argentina with Messi enjoyed an epic victory over France in a 4-0 penalty shootout required to decide the winner after a 3-3 draw.
Who is the No.1 footballer of all time?
Messi is the right choice for the crown of finest men footballer of all time. Messi absolutely fits right as the No1 footballer of all time. Also, Messi’s heir is apparently going to be Kylian Mbappe, the French giant. Looking at his potential of playing against Messi in the final and score of 3 leading to the draw, it is clear that Mbappe is going to be next generation’s No. 1 footballer in the world.
Messi has been the most favourite and popular football star of FIFA World Cup 2022. He proved that he deserved people’s wishes and love as he is the best player of World Cup 2022. Though he began fading towards the end of the tournament, he got lucky with destiny in his favour. Somehow, he succeeded to beat Mbappe in a penalty shootout and win the tournament.
The World Cup was the only title that he hasn’t had in his career of 19 years. He had won almost every title except for this and now he got this too. His failure to win the World Cup hovered over his legacy but that failure has turned into a gleaming success story.
Final stamp of greatness, an indistrupted legacy
The football megastar leaves a legacy behind him every time he wins a title. By five years of entering his professional career, he was apparently dancing alongside the two gods of football – Maradonas and the Peles. Peles is also known as the King of footballer of all time.
Speaking about the World Cup, both the gods earned their legacy at a much earlier stage of their career (Maradona won the World Cup at 25 while Pele earned it at 17 only). Then, they spent the rest of their lives maintaining or protecting their reputation which was made following the World Cup wins. In contrast, Messi changed the course. He spent his 19-year long career building a reputation as the greatest footballer on the earth and during the final years of his career, he marked it with a final stamp of greatness, the World Cup.
He is a leading goal scorer in South America as well as considered the best goal player Barcelona has ever seen in its history. He is unbelievably good at scoring goals, assists, titles, personal achievements, etc. To name his staggering achievements, he has a total of 41 trophies including 10 La Liga titles, seven Ballon d’or, six European Shoes, four Champions League and four Copa del Rey.
In his entire career, the Argentine legend has scored over 800 goals in more than 1000 appearances. List of his proud moments is just unending as his way of playing suggests.
With such an “I can do anything” attitude, he is just irresistible to watch. He is unbelievably aware of what move he should make and at what time. Not for even once in his career, he had performed an unnecessary stepover. He makes so much sense when it comes to his understanding of what situation needs. As per the situation, he gives dazzling dribbles, ridiculous goals and sumptuous passes.
Now who can resist to watch such a man playing in the field with an impeccable taste. He always leaves everyone jaw dropped with his stunning performances but this World Cup would be considered an exceptional one.
Has Messi played his last World Cup?
Everytime Messi plays on International level, a question keeps popping up if he is going to retire from International Football. Is he going to retire from Argentina? Has he played in the last World Cup of his life?
Though Messi has declared that FIFA World Cup 2022 was his last World Cup, he hasn’t yet retired from Argentina. He is planning on playing a few more games as the World Football Champion. But one thing also comes in that does he really need the World Cup title to be called the greatest? Did he actually require to win the tournament to be regarded as a world class footballer? Or to be better than Ronaldo?
No, the reality is that he never needed to win this tournament to prove himself. He was already considered the brightest star amongst world footballers. It was just for the sake of his own because he probably had every football title except for this.
Emergence of Messi, the Argentine Talisman
Do you know that Argentinians were the one themselves who took the longest to acknowledge Messi’s greatness as a player.
Normally this kind of emergence in Argentina takes local football by storm. The player gets promoted as a star for River Plate or Boca Juniors before proceeding to any other European top leagues. During that period, the individual builds a strong fanbase for himself to get enough support in the league.
Messi has a completely different story to tell. He used to be a part of Newell’s Old Boys junior academy in his hometown of Rosario before he moved to Barcelona Futbol club at the age of just 13. The Spanish club was the only team which agreed to fund his extremely expensive hormone therapy required for his growth to an ordinary size individual.
Interestingly, many Argentinians were unaware of the existence of such a masterpiece until Messi as a teenager began giving stunning performances for Barcelona in La Liga. Despite having given a stunning performance and being the best player of Barcelona, Messi couldn’t succeed in reaching the same heights for Argentina.
What was it that he was unable to do for Argentina but did for the Spanish club? Did he not give much priority to the Argentina National Team? Did he like his club more than his hometown? Did his loyalty betray him?
Messi’s shy and weird personality made Argentinians suspicious of his patriotism towards his nation. This suspicion got intense when compared to chest beating patriot Maradona. They claimed that Messi doesn’t sing the anthem. They referred to him as “pecho Frio” – cold hearted which is probably one of the worst insults for an Argentine player.
Yet, he stayed fan’s favourite of all time. The young modern technology loving generation could not resist his charm and Maradona fans took a little longer to get over him. Gradually, Messi continued to win titles for the national team one by one. He won everyone over.
The whole Argentina cried with Messi when he lost the 2014 World Cup against Germany by one step. Everyone sympathised with him. Now they are celebrating with him his first World Cup win.
Messi Statistics
When it comes to defining success of a Footballer, the first factor which is considered is the goals and assists. Cristiano is a little ahead of Messi in this race with 804 goals in 1106 games in his entire career while Messi has scored 759 goals in 957 games. The statistics clearly shows that Cristiano is much ahead of Messi in terms of goals and has played 149 more matches than Messi.
| Year | Messi Goals | Messi Assists |
| 2002-03 | ||
| 2003-04 | ||
| 2004-05 | 1 | 0 |
| 2005-06 | 8 | 3 |
| 2006-07 | 17 | 3 |
| 2007-08 | 16 | 13 |
| 2008-09 | 38 | 17 |
| 2009-10 | 47 | 11 |
| 2010-11 | 53 | 23 |
| 2011-12 | 73 | 29 |
| 2012-13 | 60 | 15 |
| 2013-14 | 41 | 14 |
| 2014-15 | 58 | 27 |
| 2015-16 | 41 | 23 |
| 2016-17 | 54 | 16 |
| 2017-18 | 45 | 18 |
| 2018-19 | 51 | 19 |
| 2019-20 | 24 | 16 |
| 2020-21 | 38 | 14 |
Messi’s World Cup stats
The World Cup is one of the major factors that affect the performance of Football players. Messi’s performance in the World Cup is an important one to consider. Both the players have appeared in five consecutive World Cups: 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018 and 2022.
Messi has scored a total of 10 goals in 24 games in World Cups in his entire career. He also has 5 assists out of which 2 were made in the 2022 World Cup. Considering the World Cup performance, Messi seems to perform better in the World Cup than Ronaldo though the 2022 World Cup is his last World Cup.
