Messi squanders chance to join the greats

Argentina's 1-0 defeat by Germany in World Cup final prevented Lionel Messi, who was named Player of the Tournament, from cementing his place in the pantheon of the truly great.

While the 27-year-old has won everything there is to win -- and broken every record there is to break -- with Barcelona, the final offered him the opportunity to definitively seal his legacy in the sport.

Pele, Zinedine Zidane and Ronaldo all scored decisive goals in finals, while Diego Maradona created the goal that settled the 1986 tournament, but Messi found himself upstaged by Mario Goetze's sensational extra-time winner for Germany.

He would be haunted in particular by a glaring opportunity early in the second half, when he found himself with only Germany goalkeeper Manuel Neuer to beat, but whipped his shot wide.

It was to be his only clear sight of goal and his failure to seize the chance continued a narrative that had taken root earlier in the knockout phase.

Whereas Maradona had seemed to grow with each match as Argentina surged to the title in 1986, scoring braces against England and Belgium in the quarter-finals and semi-finals, Messi appeared to shrink.

After dazzling in the group phase with four goals, he made the winning goal for Angel di Maria against Switzerland in the last 16, but in his own encounter with Belgium he flickered only sporadically, and in the semi-final against the Netherlands he was anonymous.

He has now gone four games without scoring for the first time under the stewardship of coach Alejandro Sabella, losing his capacity to make a difference at precisely the wrong time.

His inability to reverse Argentina's fate at the Maracana suggested that the fatigue of which his father has spoken weighed more heavily upon him that he has yet admitted.

With 354 goals in 425 games for Barcelona, many of them works of art, his genius cannot be denied, but as he himself has admitted, there is no substitute for a World Cup winner's medal.