BarcelonaWhile Barça is following a process of reconstruction based on the prominence of young people, Leo Messi has not yet put on his boots in 2022 with PSG. The Argentine has just passed the coronavirus and this Thursday he made a post on social media in which he said that it has cost him more than he thought to recover but that he had worked 100% to be ready for a year “full of beautiful challenges.” He will have to wait a little longer to see him on the pitch again, as he is still training on the sidelines and is practically ruled out to play this weekend against Brest.
When Messi talks about “beautiful challenges” he does so in reference to the Champions League, which he has not raised with his arms since the final in Berlin in 2015. The picture of seeing the Argentine, along with Neymar and Mbappé, celebrating the trophy in the final of St. Petersburg is the wet dream of the owner of the Parisian club, Sheikh Nasser al-Khelaifi. Perhaps this is the only and last season that all three play together in the artificial French project, as Mbappé is still not renewed while Florentino Pérez is counting down the days to take him to Real Madrid.
The white team will be a tough nut to crack in the round of 16 of the Champions League, a match in which PSG will need the best version of Messi, who have only been seen in France on rare occasions. Of course, the Argentine has shown his potential in the top European competition as in the victory in the Parc des Princes against Manchester City (2-0), but he has not had enough to rank his team as the first group. Although the French trident’s luxury trident wanted to show off some photos of all three together on social media, the chemistry between Messi, Neymar and Mbappé has not been seen much, however, in the French championship.
The contribution of the former Barça captain is remarkable in the Champions League, with five goals in five games, although his team was beaten in the decisive duel by the first position against Pep Guardiola’s team in the Etihad (2-1). On the other hand, in the French league, Messi’s figures contrast with those that made Barça fans happy for so many years. The Argentine, embroiled in some controversy when the team was just beginning to enter due to the management of Mauricio Pochettino’s efforts, had achieved regularity in minutes before the end of the year (he played whole six championship matches before catching the coronavirus), but he has only scored one goal, against Nantes.
“Their numbers in Ligue 1 are partly explained by the fact that PSG often face very defensive, physical teams that play very close behind. This obviously makes it more difficult to find the spaces to score. In the Champions League, on the other hand, in the Champions League the matches are different, with more comings and goings, in which Messi has been able to better express his football “, the French journalist expert in the analysis of international football explains to ARA , Alain Valnegri. But at Barça, the Argentine also often ran into closed defenses and came away with great goalscoring figures.
The changes in the middle of the field
In this sense, Valnegri points out another crucial factor: “One of the main problems affecting Messi is that PSG has not yet defined a midfield that has played a dozen games on a regular basis. This prevents the automaticity. “If the Argentine does not find a definite structure and support in the team that will help him make a difference in the last third of the field, this will have a direct impact on his performance.” In the last six Ligue 1 games that the former Barça player played in full, PSG did not repeat the same midfield.
Although Messi has distributed five assists in the French league, the poor scoring figures have meant that the Argentine has often been the donkey of the blows of the press of the French country. So has coach Mauricio Pochettino, who is constantly being questioned as Zinedine Zidane’s long shadow hovers over him. Although PSG has a luxury trident, of which Valnegri points out that “Messi has not had much trouble adapting to it”, the analyst recalls that the Argentine, between joining the team late and who has had some problems with injuries and lately with coronavirus, “has not been able to play many games”. In total, he has played five Champions and eleven in Ligue 1.
Neymar has also had physical problems, which explains the difficulty that the Argentine and the Brazilian have had to play together. “When they matched, they were constantly looking for each other. Also with Mbappé,” said Valnegri. Despite this, in some matches against rivals from the top of the French championship in which all three have played, such as the defeat against Stade Rennes (2-0) or the draw against Olympique de Marseille (0-0), things have not quite worked out for the Argentine with PSG. These results, however, do not prevent the Parisian team from leading Ligue 1 with a good cushion of points.
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