5 greatest footballers to have never won the FIFA World Cup

#1 Lionel Messi

Country: Argentina

World Cups played: 2006, 2010, 2014, 2018

Best finish: Second place, 2014

The best player at the 2014 World Cup and the five-time Ballon d'Or winner stands in a curious position internationally. While he has always been a firecracker for Argentina, his team has never won anything substantial.

His 65 goals for the national team shows that he has given the output, but has never received the support required for international glory. Nonetheless, it is a relatively easy argument to make for Messi to be one of the greats of all time and certainly the greatest to have never won the World Cup.

Lionel Messi was a breath away from glory in 2014, but a Mario Gotze goal ended his dream of being a World Cup champion in extra time. Having played the same amount of World Cups as his greatest rival, Cristiano Ronaldo, Messi has fared better than his Portuguese counterpart.

His 2014 run was heartbreaking, but they were tasked to beat one of the greatest World Cup team of all time in the 2014 Germany squad. Germany ended his World Cup dream four years prior in 2010 too, as Argentina were hammered 4-0 in the quarters.

A listless Messi and Argentina couldn't limp past 2018 champions France in the R016 in the latest edition either. Despite those losses, Messi has firmly established himself as one of the greatest and even has a World Cup golden ball lining his trophy case, thus making his case as one of the greatest men to never won the world cup even stronger.

Edited by Rahul Arun