Brazilians Pele, Neymar and Ronaldo Nazario praise Messi’s genius

The Brazilians Pelé, Neymar and Ronaldo Nazario congratulated and praised Lionel Messi this Sunday for the World Cup title, celebrating the genius of the fundamental Argentine in the competition won in the final against France in the penalty shoot-out.

“Today [domingo] football continued to tell its story, as always, in an exciting way. Lionel Messi won his first World Cup, as he deserved on his way, ”Pele wrote on Instagram.

Messi opened the scoring in the 23rd minute with a penalty, in extra time he scored 3-2 in the 108th minute, and then converted the first penalty in a tie-break that ended 4-2 in favor of the South Americans.

With two goals scored, he climbed to fourth place in the rankings of the best scorers ever in the world, with the same 13 goals as the Frenchman Just Fontaine in 1958, accurately dethroning Pelé, whom Mbappe, the 2018 champion, equaled, with 12 : Germany’s Miroslav Klose leads with 16, followed by Ronaldo Nazario with 15 and Gerd Müller with 14.

“Congratulations, Argentina! Of course Diego (Maradona) is smiling now,” added the three-time world champion in 1958, 1962 and 1970, who also praised Mbappe and Morocco’s “incredible campaign” for making Africa shine.

Ronaldo Nazario said “a worthy farewell to a genius who, in addition to being the star of the World Cup, led an entire era.”

“His football dispels any rivalry. I saw so many Brazilians – and people from all over the world – supporting Messi in this exciting final,” said the two-time world champion in 1994 and 2002.

Neymar, on the other hand, wrote “congratulations my brother” by posting a photo of his Paris Saint-Germain teammate caressing the World Cup before being handed to him for lifting.

Messi, 35, a seven-time Ballon d’Or winner, has already been an Olympic champion, won the Copa América and won several European and world club titles, missing out on being the Argentinean champion who got it this Sunday.