Aguero continues to walk in Lionel Messi’s shadow
manchester — There is nothing between Sergio Aguero and Lionel Messi off the pitch, but in the Champions League, the Manchester City striker continues to walk in the Barcelona superstar’s shadow.
Aguero was dropped for City’s game at Barcelona on Oct. 19 and by the time he came on, as a 79thminute substitute, Messi had set his side en route to a 4-0 win with his 37th career hat trick.
Aguero is expected to start when Barcelona visit the Etihad Stadium on Tuesday, having scored twice in Saturday’s 4-0 win at West Bromwich Albion, but manager Pep Guardiola remains on his case.
“He is part of the history of this club and will be forever, but I would like to help him,” said Guardiola, who enjoyed stunning success with Messi at Barcelona between 2008 and 2012.
“He can still write the most brilliant pages in his career in this club. He’s one of the best, absolutely. But I want to help him be much, much better.”
While Guardiola is thought to harbour reservations about Aguero’s work-rate and overall contribution, he believes that “in the box” at least, he is on the same level as Messi.
Aguero and Messi have been close friends since they met while playing for Argentina at the 2005 U-20 World Cup in the Netherlands.
Aguero, then playing for Independiente in his homeland, astonished his team-mates by asking Messi who he was, having not recognised the burgeoning star of the Barcelona youth team.
But they ended up rooming together and have been international room-mates ever since, Messi penning the foreword to Aguero’s 2014 autobiography. Aguero is a year Messi’s junior, but in football terms he was more precocious, making his Independiente debut aged just 15.
The pair began to cross swords regularly after Aguero joined Atletico Madrid in 2006 and might even have ended up playing in the same team.
Former Barcelona sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta revealed earlier this year that prior to signing Luis Suarez from Liverpool in 2014, the club’s number-one target had been Aguero.
Aguero joined City in 2011 and entered club folklore in his first season by scoring the 94th-minute goal against Queens Park Rangers on the season’s final day that gave Roberto Mancini’s men the title.
He has won four major honours at the Etihad and his brace at West Brom took him to 149 goals in the club’s colours, lifting him past City great Francis Lee. —