IAN LADYMAN ON MESSI
He plays like a great fighter, hitting hard when it matters
WHEN Chelsea took the lead here at Stamford Bridge, there were anguished looks towards the Barcelona bench from some visiting players. Luis Suarez, in particular, looked positively bereft.
Lionel Messi, though, merely bent down to tie his bootlaces. It looked like a moment of deliberate readying and it turned out that way.
With 15 minutes to go, Andres Iniesta burst into the area and when he pulled the ball back, Messi eased into space to bury his first goal against Chelsea and place Barcelona in control of this tie.
The key here was the space. It is Messi’s ability to find it and use it that so often sets him apart from other players even at his exalted level of the game.
On a crowded field, with the stakes high, there was nobody within touching distance of him as he moved on to Iniesta’s pass. If it didn’t happen so often we might think it an accident.
As strange as it sounds, we are reaching that time when there will only be so many chances left to watch Messi. But Messi himself refuses to understand this.
The heartbeat of yet another Barcelona incarnation, Messi will be 31 by the time this summer’s World Cup is done. In Argentina, they feel it may be his final one.
So we savour nights like this, nights when the greatest footballer of our generation cheats the passing of time on the back of skills, appetite and intuitive understanding that refuse to wane.
Maybe we should not be surprised that Barcelona’s No 10 retains his youthful capacities. There is not a player alive who understands the rhythm of a game and the intricacies of his own game like he does.
Unlike many, Messi does not seek the ball, he does not hunt the ball. Instead he finds pieces of solitude, waiting for the ball, the game, to come to him. His mind is always switched on but the body only follows when he has possession.
This could be the secret of the enduring brilliance. Certainly Messi would make a mockery of modern running stats. If there was a similar measurement available for lurking then he would top the list.
To play only in small, isolated bursts takes great skill and great confidence. If you watch Messi closely, you will see that he spends much of his time simply walking.
But when the mood takes him Messi plays like a great fighter fights. He coasts and then he hits hard when it matters. Timing, they call it.
No better example of this came when he scored. Messi, laces securely tied, increased his output in direct correlation to his team’s need. But he still existed largely on the fringes until his moment came to step into the lights.
Messi had enjoyed sporadic moments of real influence prior to this moment. Even when the going is heavy, he rarely wastes a pass.
For example, when he received the ball just inside the Chelsea half in the 10th minute he suddenly sprang forward, easing past Pedro and N’Golo Kante and then bursting on, legs whirring, past Antonio Rudiger to lay the ball off to Paulinho on the right.
When the ball arrived at the near post seconds later, it was Messi who was within an inch of turning it in. At that point it was Barcelona’s most progressive moment and Messi had his name on it.
The modern Barcelona play a little differently under coach Ernesto Valverde. They are slightly less expansive. But Messi remains unchanged, hefted securely to the Pep Guardiola creed. His movement remains difficult to track, he presses the opposition when necessary and he is always available, always with his head up on the half turn, always making decisions and taking choices before the ball has reached him.
Chelsea have played against Messi enough times to know the feeling. Defenders dare not get too close because he will be away on the back of one trick.
But if you give him — and by the same token yourself — space then he will use that precious time to hurt you anyway. The dilemma here largely belonged to Kante. The Chelsea holding player reads the game as well as anybody in the Premier League and is quick over the ground too.
But he is not Messi quick over 10 yards. Who really is? So this was a night for concentration and good decisions. It gives you a headache just to think about it. Suarez is supposed to be the furthest player forward in this Barcelona team but often it is Messi. Suarez is the kind of player who needs to be involved to feel verified. Messi is different. He seeks only the worthwhile.
Before this game Chelsea manager Antonio Conte said Messi gives him sleepless nights. Here the Italian’s state of mind was eased by the diligence of Kante and the supplementary efforts of Cesc Fabregas.
But still Messi scored — still he found the space to change the tie — and it is easy to fear his influence in the Nou Camp next month. The return leg will be his kind of night.
Messi continues to carry his unique threat deep into his 13th Barcelona year. Still walking, still lurking, still hurrying, still causing panic.