Things haven’t quite gone according to plan for Lionel Messi at Paris Saint-Germain.
The Argentinian was surprisingly not re-signed by Barcelona after it was believed he would sign one final contract with the Catalan club before retirement.
PSG moved swiftly to secure Messi’s services in order to pair him up with his old Barcelona colleague, Neymar, and French World Cup winner, Kylian Mbappe.
It’s a dream front three for any team to have, but it’s true that Messi hasn’t quite hit the heights in the French capital.
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One former PSG legend, Jerome Rothen, hasn’t held back in his condemnation of the player and his attitude.
“Messi will not leave a mark on PSG,” he said to MARCA, cited by Mirror.
“He is the boy of another club, Barca, which is his life, also in terms of the city – he goes there when he has days off.
“He is passing through PSG, nobody expected him to be there, not even himself. He has signed a two-year contract at 34, he is surely the best player in history of football but he does not have the legs that he did before, he cannot repeat the same level of efforts as he did before.
“And besides, and above all, he doesn’t have the same team or the same teammates as at Barca.
“You have to feel good at a club and now at PSG there are many problems in adapting the players so that Leo feels good and that affects private life.
“So I don’t think he will make a mark at PSG like Zlatan Ibrahimovic and although the history of PSG is shorter compared to others you cannot put Messi up there with the greatest.”
If the team go on and lift a maiden Champions League title, there’s likely to be a thawing towards Messi, though old foes Real Madrid firstly lie in wait in the knockout rounds, a tie that’s far from easy for the Ligue Un champions-elect.
Should they not, there’s a strong likelihood that Rothen won’t be the only ex-PSG man to put the boot in on Messi.
Clearly, any European failures aren’t only his fault, but the best player in the world was almost certainly bought with the idea of success on the continent in mind.