Lionel Messi - To Pass, Or Not To Pass
Just when everyone thought there was only so much wizardry that Lionel Messi could produce, he goes and does something as outrageous as pass from a penalty kick.
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Article by Brian Ennion
*e-Football are looking for football fans of all clubs as writers of match previews/reports, opinion based articles and nostalgic pieces. Interested in this amazing opportunity? e-mail e-football@live.co.uk.
Article by Brian Ennion
Only a few days before, I’d been at Goodison Park and watched Ross Barkley score with what looked like the pinnacle of penalty taking excellence; a deft little chip that left Rob Elliot in the Newcastle goal looking an utter fool, but Messi! He didn’t even score and yet he somehow managed to leave the entire Celta Vigo team looking like fools. It was an act of quite maverick genius, but there are those who would say that in fact, it was a breathtaking display of arrogance.
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Which one it was, I suppose depends on your overall standpoint. There are people out there who would love nothing better than to see Messi taken down a peg or two. These people look at Messi and see that while he is undeniably gifted, he has no right to make fun of teams and rub their faces in just how indescribably better he is than everyone else. To these people, poking fun at inferior beings is not in the spirit of true sportsmanship; it’s akin to Jesus being nailed to the cross and just looking down and smiling at everyone without dying. Their view is that people who are better than everyone else should keep their God given talents to themselves. It is the view of the types of people who visit the Sistine Chapel and grumble that Michelangelo was just showing off.
Which one it was, I suppose depends on your overall standpoint. There are people out there who would love nothing better than to see Messi taken down a peg or two. These people look at Messi and see that while he is undeniably gifted, he has no right to make fun of teams and rub their faces in just how indescribably better he is than everyone else. To these people, poking fun at inferior beings is not in the spirit of true sportsmanship; it’s akin to Jesus being nailed to the cross and just looking down and smiling at everyone without dying. Their view is that people who are better than everyone else should keep their God given talents to themselves. It is the view of the types of people who visit the Sistine Chapel and grumble that Michelangelo was just showing off.
It is a strange thing about this race of mankind we belong to that we can produce people capable of such bravado and astonishing achievements and yet as a society we are taught it is always best to show humility.
The people pillorying Messi for his latest act of brilliance rightly ask the question of what the reaction would have been if Cristiano Ronaldo had done the same thing. Of course, we all know the answer. I remember watching a League Cup final between Manchester United and Wigan back when Ronaldo was still a youngster. With United comfortably ahead on the scoreboard and frankly running rings around Wigan, Ronaldo picked up the ball and started doing keepy-ups in the centre of the pitch. How people howled with dismay at the young upstart who dared to show such contempt during the final of a major trophy. There was never even a hint of the debate people are currently having about Messi. Ronaldo was arrogant, as simple as that, and no one would broker any argument. For some reason, the two greatest players in the world have always been perceived very differently by people.
The people pillorying Messi for his latest act of brilliance rightly ask the question of what the reaction would have been if Cristiano Ronaldo had done the same thing. Of course, we all know the answer. I remember watching a League Cup final between Manchester United and Wigan back when Ronaldo was still a youngster. With United comfortably ahead on the scoreboard and frankly running rings around Wigan, Ronaldo picked up the ball and started doing keepy-ups in the centre of the pitch. How people howled with dismay at the young upstart who dared to show such contempt during the final of a major trophy. There was never even a hint of the debate people are currently having about Messi. Ronaldo was arrogant, as simple as that, and no one would broker any argument. For some reason, the two greatest players in the world have always been perceived very differently by people.
So, the people currently expressing their indignation at Messi ask why his behaviour is treated with a tolerance that would never be afforded to Ronaldo, and it is a fair question to ask, but just because Ronaldo was and still is roundly condemned for his perceived arrogance, that does not mean the condemnation is just. What is the point in living in a world populated by geniuses if we are not able to stand in awe and watch them express themselves? Shouldn’t we be grateful that in a cosmos that is billions of years old, we were lucky enough to be born at the right time to watch Lionel Messi play football? If Shakespeare had been told to stop writing plays because he was embarrassing other playwrights, would our society truly be any richer?
Football just like any other arena where people can express themselves, is art. Just like any art form, there are some practitioners who are better at it than others. Lionel Messi just happens to be the greatest practitioner of it that this generation has seen. To stop him performing with freedom would be akin to censorship and how could we seriously continue to call football ‘O Jogo Bonito’ in such circumstances.
Incidentally, Messi is not the first man to pass a penalty. It was once done by Johan Cruyff, the man who Rudolf Nureyev, the great ballerina, once said should have been a dancer.
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