Lionel Messi at the Club World Cup: The tactical risk of relying on an ageing genius

New York Times

7 hours ago

To say Lionel Messi is by far the best player in this Inter Miami team is unfair. He is more akin to a pink human vortex through which all things bright and beautiful must pass.
There is a shared understanding among his team-mates that if Messi is open to receive a pass then pass to Messi they shall, no matter the context or alternative options, even if he is standing on their toes.
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The same deference has been shown throughout his career with Barcelona, Paris Saint-Germain and Argentina, albeit to a less extreme extent given the higher quality of footballer he has had alongside him in those instances, but making any team so malleable to the movements of one of its players comes at a cost.
Miami displayed the pros and cons of such a trade-off as they drew 0-0 with Egypt's Al Ahly on Saturday to kick off the Club World Cup.
Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni has found a way to platform Messi and relieve a man who turns 38 in just over a week's time of defensive duties by playing him off the right flank and finding a support structure that allows him to drift while maintaining team balance.
Scaloni's Miami counterpart Javier Mascherano has not, and it caused his side to look like a dishevelled mess for much of the first half. He conceded as much when interviewed by the tournament's broadcaster DAZN at half-time.
'We have to improve in transitions,' he said. 'We are losing the ball and sometimes we are not well organised to stop the transition. They are very dangerous. We knew that, so we have to be much better in that phase.'
Messi started up front with Luis Suarez in what was nominally a 4-4-2 but, after 15 minutes, realised that his only hope of getting on the ball was to come deep and get it himself.
This is the dilemma for Miami — and any team who rely so much on one individual. Without Messi dropping into midfield, there is little ball progression, but him doing so causes the entire shape of the team to morph into an unstructured free-for-all.
The dangers were highlighted in the 16th minute, shown in the clip below.
Messi received the ball from defence and tried to play a one-two but the return pass was too heavy and Al Ahly suddenly had a potential three-v-two breakaway situation.
The concept of rest defence — a term which essentially means the shape of the team behind the ball — was close to non-existent for Miami.
Part of that is due to Mascherano's setup, which sees both full-backs push up high and wide, with the two wingers tucking inside to form a front four with Messi and Suarez.
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Sergio Busquets and Federico Redondo are there in the centre of midfield to provide stability but neither is mobile enough to make up for the huge gaps down both flanks. The two centre-backs also tend to drop off, which leaves space behind the midfield too. Those two things together are a recipe for counter-attack disaster — heaven, if you are the opposition.
As early as the eighth minute, the problem was clear, particularly with Tomas Aviles so deep at the back.
Of course, the upside of Messi dropping deep is obvious. His brain sees pictures on the pitch that nobody else's does and his ability to orchestrate is what elevates Miami above being an average MLS team, as shown in the clip below, where his footwork and vision opened up the left flank to attack.
But the risk is in the vacuum that his presence creates as his team-mates vacate the area for him. Again, they are one loose pass away from being wide open.
In the 24th minute, there was an example of Messi foraging for space by drifting out wide to get away from the man-marking tactics Al Ahly employed anytime he loitered up front. On this occasion, he did not get the ball but, by coming out to that flank, it forced Miami right-back Ian Fray to push higher up and squeezed their right-winger Tadeo Allende inside.
When the forward pass into Suarez was not retained, Al Ahly were able to play one ball right through the middle of the pitch due to the lack of compactness. Trezeguet could receive behind the Miami midfield and drive at the defence, until Aviles cynically stopped the counter-attack, for which he was shown a yellow card.
During the middle period of the first half, Miami's issues in transition saw them leaking like a sieve. Al Ahly should have been a couple of goals ahead by this point and his team's plight saw Messi become increasingly present in deeper positions as he attempted higher-risk passes to try to find a way forward.
In the move below, he tried to play in Fray with the outside of his boot but the ball was cut out and the men from Cairo were free to break again. Within two passes, they were almost through.
Messi tried to stay in the vicinity of Busquets at times to take advantage of his former Barcelona team-mate's technical ability in small spaces and familiar thought process. But Busquets struggled throughout the game and gave the ball away again here.
Al Ahly were able to resist the counter-press but Miami then completely dropped off as players returned to their defensive slots, which saw the 2023-24 African champions cut through the middle of them once more with two runners in behind free to be played through on goal.
Mascherano took off Aviles at half-time and replaced him with Marcelo Weigandt, a change which saw Fray move inside to play centre-back. It helped Miami's counter-press as there were not such huge gaps behind their midfield in transition, but Messi also stopped coming into a holding midfield position during the first period after the break.
Miami were more patient but struggled to create until Messi started drifting deeper again, which in turn saw the Al Ahly counter-attack threat return late in the game.
Reliance on Messi is natural. He was the best player on the pitch on Saturday night. But Mascherano has to find a more sustainable way of playing through him without sacrificing team shape.
If it had been a better team than Al Ahly — say Porto, Miami's opponents in their second group game on Thursday — they could have been looking at an embarrassing scoreline by half-time.
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