How good is Messi's passing and vision?

John was decieved :vagi:

Messi's passing is 84.3 vs Xavi's 92. Messi likes to play lay offs but Busquets is the more complete passer as he gets the transitions going with longer passes and got a passing completion of 91 percent.

Barcelona's main transitions however often go from the defence into players between the lines like Messi and then back to the midfield to control from there. Villas Boas explains it very well in this interview in the telegraph from August:

Guardiola has talked about it: the centre backs provoke the opponent, invite them forward then, if the opponent applies quick pressure the ball goes to the other central defender, and this one makes a vertical pass.
Not to the midfielders, who have their back turned to the ball, but to those moving between lines, Andres Iniesta or Lionel Messi, or even directly to the striker.
Then they play the second ball with short lay-offs, either to the wingers who have cut inside or the midfielders, who now have the game in front of them.

Yes but you should put into account that Busquets very rarely needs to put or does put a last pass as an assist, now statistics will not show you how difficult the passes were, but just the amount that got received against the ones that didnt.

for Messi, Xavi, Iniesta and Fabregas and Alves are generally the ones who do those last passes, certainly the % must go down when you take a bigger risk, Busquets acts as a knot between two ropes, that knot has to keep it tight and safe.

Hamdyman wrote:Yes but you should put into account that Busquets very rarely needs to put or does put a last pass as an assist, now statistics will not show you how difficult the passes were, but just the amount that got received against the ones that didnt.

for Messi, Xavi, Iniesta and Fabregas and Alves are generally the ones who do those last passes, certainly the % must go down when you take a bigger risk, Busquets acts as a knot between two ropes, that knot has to keep it tight and safe.

Yes but he starts the transitions. He can knock those balls for 90 minutes without losing concentration. Yes he did not make the final pass but he started it normally. But Messi and Alves are leading the assists with Fabregas and Xavi on 8 and 6. But it those quick interchanges with the passing and the combo's and the accuracy of the passing while doing it that cuts sides open. Then you have Messi ripping your whole formation out of shape lol

But just one more thing who do you think created that space for Alves to go into? Busquets shifting to CB Puyol to RB and Alves is free all thanks to Busquets

Spooony wrote:

Hamdyman wrote:Yes but you should put into account that Busquets very rarely needs to put or does put a last pass as an assist, now statistics will not show you how difficult the passes were, but just the amount that got received against the ones that didnt.

for Messi, Xavi, Iniesta and Fabregas and Alves are generally the ones who do those last passes, certainly the % must go down when you take a bigger risk, Busquets acts as a knot between two ropes, that knot has to keep it tight and safe.

Yes but he starts the transitions. He can knock those balls for 90 minutes without losing concentration. Yes he did not make the final pass but he started it normally. But Messi and Alves are leading the assists with Fabregas and Xavi on 8 and 6. But it those quick interchanges with the passing and the combo's and the accuracy of the passing while doing it that cuts sides open. Then you have Messi ripping your whole formation out of shape lol

But just one more thing who do you think created that space for Alves to go into? Busquets shifting to CB Puyol to RB and Alves is free all thanks to Busquets

Not taking away any of Busquets additions to this squad, he is awsome and doing his role perfectly, i was just stating the fact that we should not call him more "complete" as a passer since his role is slightly less risky.