Diego Maradona:
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Maradona has been villified for apparently having a direct hand in Messi’s retirement, but if there is one footballer who Messi can completely relate to in both technical and other footballing aspects, it is Diego Maradona, who had a very similar skillset and arguably played with a weaker supporting cast for the length of his international career.
Maradona had to face innumerable challenges in the form of an unsupportive, corrupt-to-the-core Argentine football association, apart from the myriad other challenges that all footballers faced in his heyday. Yet, if there is one individual who inspired his team to overall brilliance and international success, one needs to look no further than him.
Of course, he is not the best role model as a person off the pitch. Maradona has been an outspoken critic and has had a history of drug abuse, including a period in which he was banned from playing competitive football. But holding that against him as a footballer is unjust and unfair, for he was somehow always able to produce the goods for his country whenever needed.
One only needs to look at the World Cup of 1986 to see the stamp of one individual over the course of footballing history. With 5 goals and 5 assists, including the rather infamous brace he scored against England in the quarterfinals, he guided Argentina to the title past a marauding West Germany side in the final.
Even in the World Cup of 1990, he was quite clearly the best player to come out on the pitch, and he once again led Argentina to the final, where they would lose 1-0 to Germany courtesy a controversial penalty secured by Juergen Klinsmann.
For him to come back from what he saw as an unjust ban and still display the class he did for Boca Juniors back home in Argentina has to serve as inspiration for Messi.
