Very little doubt in my mind, Messi has peaked

cyberman wrote:Peaked? You expected messi to get better? Lol he's already proclaimed as the best ever...at twenty four. I'm pretty sure that's the talent ceiling for any player ever...

free_cat wrote:Watch games of Pele and Maradona and you will probably change your mind. They were definitely not better than Messi in a football that was played 5x slower than today.

free_cat wrote:Watch games of Pele and Maradona and you will probably change your mind. They were definitely not better than Messi in a football that was played 5x slower than today.

BarrileteCosmico wrote:If Maradona didn't have a ceiling, coke definitely put one in him for him. He could've had a much better career, and this debate might not even be happening, if it were not for his own lack of discipline and professionalism. In his own words, he could've been 3 times as good.

Diego Armando Maradona wrote:Im not really arguing the game wasnt slower. But i suspect most people dont have clue what they are talking about and just repeat what they heard somewhere else. In this case there is a grain of truth but in others this is how BS internet myths get started

Vapotrini wrote:People are gonna say that this is knee jerk, and hopefully it is, but I really don't know anymore...

Seeing as I'm a self confessed, full fledged Diego fan boy, maybe this may be hard to read but I want to know. Can there be any truth to this...

The training is better. Their diets are better. The tactics are superior. Their opposition and pitches are better. I've heard it all before, but my eyes don't lie... I've seen this all before.

For the past few weeks/months I've been seeing something that sits poorly with me, Messi being human. Missing stuff that even I in my little imaginary world, wouldn't miss. I first said it was a one off, but one off's don't keep on happening do they? It's not (now weekly) one offs, it's simply Messi being human. He CANNOT KEEP IT UP!

I like everyone else here keeps thinking, "wow, this guy is only 24 years old... surely the greatest to play at that age. Just imagine him at 27!" Well thinking about it, I would bet just about anything in the world that he won't be any where remotely as good as he is now when he's 27. How could he be though??? Football and training have evolved to such a level that these guys are way beyond their predecessors. Sure there are exceptions to the rule, but generally the norm is going to be a far earlier peak from yesteryear. It's reaching a point now where I'm asking myself if Messi at just 24 years old is actually regressing? Forget the penalties. When last has he even attempted to chip a keeper? You may say well, that not a big deal, but think about it. If you're a keeper and you know there's no chip coming, you can storm out with confidence and basically know that it's just 50/50 from there. Left or right. Such a huge weapon, why has he forsaken it? Makes him a whole lot more predictable. This is a tool in his arsenal that he should be using more with his now vast experience, however it's now non-existent in his game. Puzzling.

On to Dribbling: It may just be me, but in the past I can't recall ever seeing him lose the ball as much as he does now. He's dribbling less which is natural, cause he's getting older and using his smarts, picking when to dribble, which is all great... but the problem is (in my eyes), he's actually losing the ball more now - dribbling less, losing the ball more. No matter how you wanna justify or spin that, it's not good. Put another way, what does Messi do today that he didn't do as well or better in at least 2 years gone by? Be honest with yourselves. What is he better at? I'll give him the killer through ball but that was always going to come. Every single player gets better at passing, that's given. In my mind, he doesn't do anything other than that better. One could argue it's quite the contrary. But wait, isn't he supposed to peak at 25? Isn't he supposed to be getting clearly better? Sorry to say, from where I'm sitting, he's clearly not getting better. And don't for a second bring up stats cause all I've been seeing lately is his teammates give up GREAT opportunities to feed him the ball. Frustratingly so! Stats won't and can't show that. Stats are not going to tell the whole story the same way they didn't when CR7 broke the la liga record last year. It's shameful at times the way these guys are spoon fed.

From where I'm sitting, the simple truth is that Messi is an early bloomer. Hell, all footballers are nowadays with the training that now exists. This is why I always say, don't judge him now... judge him after he hangs up his boots. Things are entirely different now from days gone by, a player now at 24 is "probably" equivolant to a player close to 30, two decades ago. That's why comparing Messi to Pele, Platini, Zico, Maradona, insert name here, when they were 24, is utterly ridiculous. It doesn't work that way. It can't, these players simply can't continue excelling. They're gonna hit their peak a lot earlier.

Wish I was wrong but I know in my heart, we've already seen the best of Messi. A little disappointing considering his age, but training nowadays is too rigorous for these guys to keep these ridiculous levels up. No matter the player, no matter the generation, you get a really SPECIAL 4-5 years of pure genius... after that, it's more reputation than anything else that will carry you. Hope I'm wrong but deep down inside, I know I'm absolutely right. Seen it too many times before... and I'll bet quite a bit that it's happening here right before my very eyes, yet again. Sadly enough...

Hapless_Hans wrote:No doubt Messi has peaked and is not as good anymore as 4 years back.
That being said, he's still head and shoulders above the rest @ Barca FC

BarrileteCosmico wrote:It only took him 2.5 years for his predictions to become slightly less lol-worthy

I like everyone else here keeps thinking, "wow, this guy is only 24 years old... surely the greatest to play at that age. Just imagine him at 27!" Well thinking about it, I would bet just about anything in the world that he won't be any where remotely as good as he is now when he's 27.

Bankz wrote:It was good while it lasted, maybe we can say his peak was the best we ever saw along with R9, dinho, maradona, cruyff, and pele..strictly speaking of peaks.

Ganso wrote:Even while playing sub par, his overall game is better than CR's

Dnmac4 wrote:LOL, this thread is so stupid.  Haters will always hate, its just a fact of life.

Dnmac4 wrote:Claiming that Messi has peaked the year he scored over 90 goals in a calendar year with like 75 of them coming for his club team alone is supposed to be some sort of revelation?  No shit, no one with a brain expected those numbers again.

Dnmac4 wrote:During that season the same haters were claiming he's selfish and ruins Barca's system and hasn't done anything for Argentina. (there was a ton of that going on back then).

Dnmac4 wrote:Now he plays on a much worse team, is scoring about a goal per game and assisting almost at that rate plus he just won player of the tournament in the World Cup and dragged Argentina to the finals and to overtime of the final game while his other "world class" attacking partners shit the bed.

And now the haters want to see him be more selfish and score 90 goals again.  He just can't win.  Either way there going to hate.

Dnmac4 wrote:It may be decades before you see something like that again or you may never see it again in our life time.  Or Ronaldo could challenge it this year.

Ronaldo gets the same sort of haters who just can't sit back and enjoy these two players who you will probably never see again in the next couple generations.

I just don't get it.

And just to put that year into context.  That year he scored 13 more club goals than Ronaldo's best year on any team.

And Ronaldo is probably the best pure goal scorer I've ever seen.

Dnmac4 wrote:So yea, I would probably say you will not see anything like that again and if you want to call that peaking than go right ahead.