not maradona.....yet,,but the closest thing you will find this generation,,very very good football player,,a reason to watch football now days unlike that moron david from england who could never play nothing but pussy
Messi is very good, especially for his age, but not better than Kaka nor Cristiano R. or Robben, Van Percy and Fabregas.
We have a great generation of footballers coming up, and the amazing thing, is the age at which they're hitting big stage is astoundingly young. Messi has very low centre of gravity, extreme balance, and is two-footed, which reminds us of Diego M, but there'll never be another one, every two yrs theres another dude being compared, or even Maradonna himself does the comparison.
The game has evolved to much, theres more games and tournaments, more international fixtures, these guys burn out at 25 sometimes, especially with media attention and cash being bandied about nowadays. Another factor, is how much more physical game has become, in Maradonna's day, there was much less tackling, and players were more protected, now, defenders have become a minimum of 6foot, 190lbs, which for a footballer, is a big statistic, and they go in for the crunch. Arjen Robben has had his ankle broken 3 times(out now with injured knee), and foot twice fom tackles, Messi has played a quarter of the games he should have and started very few due to massive injury setbacks.
Maradonna in todays game would have had an even shorter career.
2 players that have supreme physical ability and know how to ride, avoid and take tackles are C Ronaldo and Kaka, real athletes, which is why they're hardly ever injured unlike others.
To put into perspective how much pressure these guys have, Cristiano is the high-profile player for Portugal since age 19, Robben and Van Percy for Holland at 19, Fabregas was at 17 for Spain, Messi and Teves for Argentina at 19 and 23.
Lets not forget Rooney, whos the great white hope of english football, at 20 he was the centre of Englands worldcup campaign. Hes good, but massvely hyped and pressurized, which aint good.
The pressure is immense, which is why guys like Beckham endorsing everything under sun,going from massive Man utd to even bigger Real Madrid with huge expectations at time, under media-spotlight night and day burn-out at 30. I dont blame him for cashing in. The man was at one time the best right-sided crosser of the ball in the world with unbeatable free kicks too.
As for new Maradona, nah, nobody can compare to him.