Lionel Messi still does not show his best performance at Paris Saint-Germain

The concern begins to settle in Paris Saint-Germain, which he still hopes to see the decisive Lionel Messi that his fans sigh for, the player who has just won the Ballon d’Or, but who with his new shirt has chained mediocre matches.

A goal and three assists in the league seem little for expectations that Parisian football, club and fans, had placed on a player who is usually hung the label of best footballer in history.

The press feeds that concern about a 34-year-old footballer who, for now, has not found his place in a team full of stars.

“Messi crashes in the league”, headlines the influential L’Équipe; while the one not less followed by Le Parisien fans considers the Argentine to be “a genius who has not yet come out of the lamp.”

The player himself recognized it last Monday, shortly after embracing the Ballon d’Or for the seventh time: “I am adjusting to a new club, a new city.”

Nor does the situation seem to worry the coach, Mauricio Pochettino, for whom “it is a matter of time.”

“We create chances and it is true that we have had bad luck. But Leo will score goals, he has an incredible talent, he has always scored goals and he will score them ”, assured the coach at a press conference.

The clock seems to go, for now, against the player, while Paris waits and grows impatient to see the version that for 17 years he showed at FC Barcelona.

Messi is not being the decisive player who solved the problems of the Barça and in the French capital hardly traces of his brilliance have been seen.

Less efficiency

The comparisons are clear: During his years at Barça, Rosario’s man scored almost one goal per game, he shot more than five times on goal, 2.5 times between the three sticks.

Messi hits less and, logically, scores much less. The 100-day grace period has just been exceeded, and so far the player has not responded in his first eight games in France.

With the Blaugrana shirt he has exceeded 30 goals in all his seasons since 2017, except for 2019-2020, when he stayed at 25.

Less hit, worse score and, according to L’Équipe, less involvement in the game, because Messi participates less in team football and try fewer dribbles.

The player has attempted less than 10 offensive plays per game, compared to the 15 he was proposing at Barça and the successful dribbles attempted did not exceed 4 in Paris, half of what he did, on average, in Spain.

Messi does not show his best physical condition, he lacks a point that can be decisive in the final stretch of danger plays.

The player has missed 8 games since his arrival, due to lack of training, injuries or commitments to his national team, which already means as many games as in the entire last season.

“He does not have the same legs,” says the newspaper Le Parisien, that he believes that the Argentine economizes his efforts and that leads him to be less incisive in the attack.

Nor do they rule out that Pochettino has not been able to find the best football to make the Argentine genius shine.

Last year, in the first 12 league games he had scored 7 goals and 4 assists, to finish the season with 38 goals and 18 decisive passes.

Paris still hopes to find the brilliance of a footballer who scored 672 goals in 778 games for Barça. (D)