Ladies and gentlemen the best football player in the world right now, Lionel Messi of Argentina. Diego Maradona himself has named Messi his successor in several different occasions, and the young player is doing everything he can lately to convince us this statement is true. The whole world is currently watching Lionel Messi and his amazing performances with Barcelona, the only question remaining is “Can Lionel Messi win the 2010 World Cup in South Africa for Argentina?”. Nobody really knows the answer, but the truth is that Messi is the only reason Argentina is now considered one of the favourites even after struggling to qualify in the tournament.

At only 13 years old some experts saw that Lionel Messi could be the heir to the throne of Diego Maradona. When Messi turned 20, fans from all over the world were starting to see it also. And now at 22 everyone agrees that he is not just Maradona, he is…Messi. The Argentinian coach didn’t even have one tenth of the accomplishments his current player has at the same age, and if Messi leads Argentina to another World Cup Trophy in South Africa, a legend is definitely being born.

At just 22 years old Messi has already won pretty much everything, including the World Player of the Year award as well as the FIFA Golden Ball. In 2006 Messi became the youngest player ever to play for Argentina in a World Cup, and at the same time the 6th youngest goalscorer in the history of the competition. He also holds the record for the youngest player and goalscorer in the Spanish football league for Barcelona, the team that has made Lionel Messi famous in every corner of the world. The Argentinian superstar is in the best form of his entire career, while leading Barcelona to the first place in every competition the team is participating in this year.

Messi has already broken his goalscoring record from the last season having 39 goals so far, and is cruising all the way to win a European Golden Shoe this year. Every time he leads Barcelona to a victory, almost automatically Argentina receives better betting odds of winning the 2010 World Cup from bookmakers. When Diego Maradona took over as head coach of the national team in late 2008 the team started going downhill. After loosing 6-1 to Bolivia – the worst result in the history of Argentina, they were staring failure in the face being only 5th in the group with 2 games left. Since then the only thing that has really changed is Lionel Messi’s extraordinary performances, no new games or new upcoming players. And still without even playing for his country Messi has somehow managed to put Argentina back in the game for winning the World Cup in South Africa all by himself.

If Diego Maradona was constantly in the news for many different reasons except his football abilities, Messi is a totally different character and keeps coming up only because he is a great humble player. The sky is definitely the limit for Lionel Messi, and after winning a sextuple last year with Barcelona (all six trophies in a single season), the next step is international gold for his country in South Africa. Even though Argentina was the Olympic gold medal winner in 2008, everybody back home is hungry for a similar outcome in the 2010 World Cup finals. Any other result will be considered a failure, especially now that the stakes are much higher.

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