Tite Refutes Messi Pele Comparison

Brazil coach Tite has played down comparisons between Argentina captain Lionel Messi and Brazil legend Pele. Messi continues to enjoy enormous success in the game and is widely regarded to be the finest player ever to play the sport. The Barcelona man has won 10 league titles, 6 Copa del Reyes, 4 Champions Leagues and […]
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sambafoot_admin
2019-11-19 19:54:00

Brazil coach Tite has played down comparisons between Argentina captain Lionel Messi and Brazil legend Pele. Messi continues to enjoy enormous success in the game and is widely regarded to be the finest player ever to play the sport.

The Barcelona man has won 10 league titles, 6 Copa del Reyes, 4 Champions Leagues and an Olympic gold medal. Individually he also boasts 5 Ballon D’Ors, and 6 golden shoes, though he has not won a trophy at full international level.

The debate rages in South America as to who can be regarded the finest ever between Maradona, Pele and Messi. Pele won 2 Copa Libertadores’ with Santos and 3 World Cups with his country.

Brazil boss Tite, who grew up watching Pele, has however refuted comparisons between Messi and Pele, insisting Pele is incomparable. "Pele is incomparable. Anybody who wants to compare Pele to any other athlete…do you know what I do? I hear but I don`t listen.

"It’s as if this person doesn’t know the history of this man’s quality… this guy was phenomenal. Once I said that Messi is extraordinary. I meant he’s extraordinary to the present time and among humans, with his creativity. Pele is out of normal patterns and I’m not saying this because I’m a Brazilian.

"I say it because I saw that story, the magnitude of Pele, his plays, the individual technique, the header, ambidextrous, his strength, his impulse. You [journalists] want to find a defect, you won’t find it."

Tite also insists that Pele’s personality gives him an edge over Messi, "And as if that were not enough, Pele had an extraordinary charisma." Pele, of course, never played in Europe, which complicates comparisons.

However, Santos played against European sides regularly in the 1960s due to Pele’s commercial appeal. Pele scored twice in the 1958 World Cup Final against Sweden aged just 17- he is also the youngest player ever to score a hat trick at the competition, surely he would get the attention of big companies like Betway and their followers.

Messi has finished as a runner-up in the World Cup with his country in 2014, losing the final to Germany in Brazil- though he was voted as player of the tournament on that occasion,. Tite denied that the strength of his opinion was informed by a spat he and Messi had during last week’s game between Argentina and Brazil.

Tite felt Messi ought to have been booked for a foul on one of his players, Messi motioned towards Tite that he should be quiet. "What happened with Messi the other day is there in the field. I just claimed a yellow and told me to shut up."

Messi scored the winner for Argentina during that game from the penalty spot in a friendly in Saudi Arabia. Messi recently took a break from playing for his country before returning during this summer’s Copa America, which was won by Brazil, who knocked Argentina out along the way.

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