Lionel Messi

You can never be too sure about how you will affect someone’s life. Our actions, words, and emotions can do so many different things across the 6 degrees that separate every single human being in the world. It is almost impossible to track how this affected that, there.

Lionel Messi is 28 years old. 

Depending on when you became a fan of soccer, that will strike you in a certain way. If you fell in love with the game around 2005 or 2006, you will probably not be able to believe your ears. “I remember when he played with Ronaldinho!” you’ll say — as in back when Ronaldinho was good. Yeah, that long ago — he has aged quite a lot in that time. He’s a man now, not a boy, not even a young man.

Jerome Boateng believed he would beat Barcelona when he walked on the field on the 6th of May, 2015. He was a part of one of the greatest teams in the world, a German machine that had just completed a ludicrous second leg comeback against FC Porto.

As Jamaica bow out of the Copa America after suffering their third 1-0 defeat in a row, Jamaican forward Deshorn Brown decided to leave with a piece of digital gold. 

Lionel Messi had an off year in 2014. He lost in the World Cup Final. He didn’t win the Ballon d’Or. His club, Barcelona, lost out on all three major trophies, including missing out on a chance to win La Liga on the very last match day of the year. By the end of the year it was looking like Barcelona, as great as they would always be, were a long way away from hitting the heights of their glorious past, and that Messi would never be able to regain the form that earned him 4 straight Ballon d’Ors.

How much have things changed. 

It’s very, very rare that Messi is surprised by something on the pitch.

So you can imagine how I reacted to seeing him bring his hands up to his face in disbelief after having his shot saved. The fact that someone stopped his shot in the first place would have been surprising enough, but when I realized that that “someone” was actually a “something,” I was just as overcome as he was.

I have no idea what the machine is called, and I have no idea what I would name it. Messi Stopper 3000 sounds cheesy; Keeperly is too cliche.

Barcelona have won the treble with possibly the deadliest front three in the modern game, and there is simply no stopping them. As Messi, Suarez and Neymar (MSN) now fight against each other in the Copa America, Luis Enrique is busy behind his desk in Spain creating the next squad that can sustain the current reputation. Which, let's be honest, is as hot as the Hindenburg right before it exploded.

Here are some of the possible line-ups Luis Enrique could use to ensure back-to-back championships:

Option 1 – Play Messi Wide, Send In Pogba As Reinforcement

There has been a lot of talk over what will happen once Father Time takes his toll on Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo; who will take their place? Many are quick to throw out names such as Pogba, Hazard, and Neymar. These names are all certainly nothing else than the most talented young players on the planet, but they are no Messi or Ronaldo.