Argentina have produced arguably the two greatest footballers of all time decades apart, but Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi couldn’t be more different off the pitch.
The former one of the game’s great characters, Maradona was the type to occupy the front pages as well as the back with his off-field exploits. Messi, on the other hand, keeps a relatively low profile for someone who won seven-Ballon d’Or awards and just about every team trophy there is to win.
Yet, because of where they are from and their similar powers with a ball at their feet, the comparison between Messi and Maradona has been made ever since the former burst onto the scene as a fresh-faced teenager at Barcelona back in 2004.
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Both played at the Camp Nou for the Blaugrana, but it was Messi who truly lit up Barcelona. With 672 goals and 266 assists, he redefined what fans deemed a ‘good’ season, taking modern football to places few thought they would ever see.
And yet, for all of his sensational effort back in Spain, Messi was regularly hounded by accusations from fans that he couldn’t repeat his club heroics for his country. A string of disappointments for Argentina both at World Cups and the Copa America only ensured the voices of discontent grew louder.
Many felt that Messi could never be dubbed the greatest of all time if he didn’t guide his nation to World Cup glory as Maradona did in 1986. However, not everyone felt that Messi had to win the tournament to enter the debate surrounding who is the best to lace up a pair of boots.
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Maradona himself felt that Messi’s status as one of the best was cemented regardless of a World Cup triumph.
“Alone, he will not be able to win the World Cup,” the late, great Argentine explained. “You need a solid team for that. Football history will remember Messi.
“Football has given him a lot, as much as he has given the sport and to win a World Cup, in my opinion, wouldn’t bring himself anything else.”
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Sadly, Maradona never got the chance to see Messi eventually shake that World Cup monkey off of his back and go the distance in Qatar 2022. By that time, he had bid farewell to Barcelona and was plying his trade for Paris Saint-Germain, who he moved to in the summer of 2021.
