Messi's defending

Even though he's a winger/attacking midfielder, Messi often has to drop deep to make creative plays. This also leads to him making defensive plays, such as tackles, interceptions, etc. That is today's topic, defending, which even though he isn't tasked to do, he is pretty well at it.

First off, let's start with a more general approach by talking about his pressures. Pressure is simply applying pressure to an opposing player who is receiving, carrying, or releasing the ball. Well, as the picture below shows, he's done plenty of those, never dropping below 5 per 90 in any of his La Liga seasons and reaching around or more than 10 pressures per 90 plenty of seasons. Since the 2017/18 season, he's done 63 pressures on the defensive third, showing how deep he can drop.

Going on more specific defensive abilities, since the 2009/10 season Messi has done 338 tackles, or 0.68 tackles per 90, and attempted 568 overall, which is 1.14 attempted tackles per 90. This also means that Messi has an accuracy of 59.5% when attempting a tackle. Not bad at all. He's also done 190 interceptions, or 0.38 interceptions per 90, which is also a good number considering his role in paper. In terms of blocks, he's blocked 123 passes since the 2013/14 season, or 0.25 passes blocked per 90, and he's also blocked 8 shots and 3 crosses. Other actions include clearances, which Messi has only done 6 times, but you can't expect Messi to drop THAT deep. To end the entry, here's a video that details that Messi can even defend successfully, more proof on why he's the most complete player in history.