Damien

Depends how you play/your team plays. Messi isn't a conventional forward. He was usually behind whomever was playing in front. He was also doing what he does at Barca which is roam back to collect the ball if he can. If you look at his assist where he threw off a few challenges before passing it to Di Maria (or that pass against Belgium I posted) he is quite deep. Yesterday he twice dribbled from quite far back.

Besides the World Cup is the whole tournament. The group stage counts. Additionally Robben is lauded but he didn't do much in the knockout stages either. The goals dried up for a lot of teams for some reason, other than Germany vs Brazil, in the later stages. Also if you're going to use one statistic then there are plenty of others where Messi came on top. Here is a good article about Messi: http://www.whoscored.com/Articles/ce...the-Tournament

Again he wasn't the best player there and he disappointed by his standards but the way people are slagging him off is ridiculous in my view. Everyone is trying to top each other in describing just how bad he was. Not the best player in the cup, wouldn't make a team of the World Cup, wasn't even one of the best 5 Argentina players. It's not long before people will be suggesting they wouldn't have taken him to the World Cup at all. He is the joint-3rd top scorer in the tournament and had some brilliant bits of play. Hell if that pass against Belgium had fallen to a better striker then he would have been involved in the assist of the tournament. Some perspective is needed.

If people want to criticize a disappointment then look at Ronaldo. He didn't turn up at all.