Perhaps Manuel Pellegrini should rub Aladdin's magic lamp and put the Lionel Messi Genie back inside it. Or maybe he should handcuff him and then tie him to a tree in the woods on Saturday night. Maybe send a Deluge and specifically tell Noah not to allow Messi to enter his Ark. Or perhaps get him drunk on Friday night.
The problem is that Messi is so nimble and so magnanimously tiny that he could easily dribble his way out of the lamp without any rubbing of its side. He is so magical that he could actually re-enact Harry Houdini and wriggle free of any handcuffs and ropes. Even if a Deluge were sent, you cannot help feeling that Messi would actually be able to walk on the water. And if Messi gets drunk on Friday night, there is a probability that the wine would turn into water inside him.
But the Real Madrid coach has to find a solution and stop the unstoppable Argentina. But what is that solution? What is that method by which Messi can be stopped? Here are a list of those probable and not-so-probable strategies that could help Madrid stop the world's best player on Saturday night.
Kick, Kick, Kick
Think of Pele in the 1966 World Cup finals. Think of Diego Armando Maradona whenever he played. Now think of Lionel Messi on December 13, 2008. While Pele was kicked out of the World Cup by Portugal and Maradona got kicked, shoved and bullied whenever he took to the pitch, Messi came under some rather blunt and unsavory but cunningly creative Machiavellian treatment from Juande Ramos' Real Madrid. The defenders and midfielders in White took turns to kick him at Camp Nou and it was so organized that you would have thought that it was part of football's textbook.
Yet as you would have in a Hollywood movie, the hero eventually vanquished the villain and in the end despite all the dark arts put into practice, Messi eventually emerged victorious. He scored the second and decisive goal and Juande Ramos' well-laid plans came crashing down. On Saturday night, a similar plan could be put into practice especially as the game is at the Santiago Bernabeu.
But the problem is that like Maradona, Messi has got used to kicking. While El Diego's defense mechanisms worked in kicking back (on several occasions) as well as in not getting bullied, Messi's work by not letting go of the ball. The 22-year-old can be kicked, pulled back, shirt tugged and pants stripped off him but rest assured, he will do whatever humanly possible to stay on his feet and run with the ball.
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