Lionel Messi still won’t usurp Diego Maradona as the greatest footballer the world has ever seen even if he wins the World Cup final.
That’s the opinion of former England, Liverpool and Nottingham Forest star turned Mirror Sport pundit Stan Collymore, who reckons the late, great Maradona will remain the best there has been because he played the game at a time when he had to overcome a physicality which just isn’t there today.
Collymore said: “If Messi wins the World Cup this afternoon then people will say he’s the greatest of all time and I understand how his CV would back that up. A World Cup winners’ medal is the one trophy missing from his cabinet and that’s the one a lot of people point to as setting Maradona aside when they’re debating the best there has been.
“But I still go back to the point that the rule changes of the last decade and more have allowed Messi to thrive in a way Maradona never got to and, for that reason, Maradona will remain the greatest for me.
"He almost single-handedly took a comparatively average Argentina team to victory at Mexico ’86 and, while some will say Messi has done the same if they do win in Qatar, it’s just such a different game now. It’s one that allows players who play the game in the way Maradona did and the way Messi does to thrive in a way it never did when Maradona was in his prime.
“The football landscape — in terms of the rules and the actual terrain — have played right into Messi’s hands or, rather, his feet. I mean, can you imagine Messi playing against some of the defenders we came up against in the Nineties in English football?
"He certainly hasn’t had to come up against anyone remotely resembling Andoni Goikoetxea, the Butcher of Bilbao, who was initially handed an 18-game ban for the ankle-breaking, ligament-shattering tackle he landed on Maradona that put him out of the game for a year.
"You have to wonder, then, whether Messi would have come back from some of the injuries Maradona did and performed at such a level if he had. Maradona had the resilience to overcome it and that’s why he still has the edge on his compatriot.”
Collymore hopes — and thinks — France will have the edge over Messi and Co at the Lusail Stadium today. He added: “I want France to win and I think they will. I have no problem with Messi and Argentina winning but I’d just like France to win because it would be a just reward for their system.
"Quite simply, they were in a situation 20-odd years ago when they needed to bring together all this incredible talent they had and they turned it into a winning factory — even when they haven’t always had a great crop. Would this team compare with some of the great teams they have had? No, probably not.
"But the technical and tactical excellence that has been pushed through the Clairefontaine system, with different teams that can do different things, really is worthy of note and worthy of respect. It has rubber-stamped its mark on football in a similar way to Ajax’s De Toekomst.”
