JAN 31 — I have to admit that my concentration on this weekend’s largely tedious FA Cup action was distracted by the remarkable, record-breaking Australian Open tennis final between Novak Djokovic and Rafa Nadal.

Watching the epic encounter with a friend led to a debate as to who is currently the greatest sportsman on the planet: Djokovic, my friend proposed; Lionel Messi, I countered.

Djokovic’s case is certainly a strong one, I will admit. The Serb has now won four of the last five Grand Slam events: the Australian Open twice; Wimbledon and the US Open. The only major honour to escape his grasp in the last year was the French Open, where he was beaten in the semi-final by Roger Federer.

The thing that makes Djokovic’s achievements even more amazing is the outstanding competition he has been forced to surpass to claim his trophies.

Federer and Nadal are living legends in their own right — many experienced tennis watchers regard Federer as the greatest player ever to have picked up a racquet, while Nadal is a physical freak and a ferocious competitor. Yet, with that one exception of the French Open, even they haven’t been able to compete with Djokovic.

Also in Djokovic’s favour over Messi is the physically relentless nature of tennis — far more so than football. In this weekend’s final, Djokovic and Nadal were playing for nearly six hours, giving maximum effort to practically every single shot in every single point and never being allowed a break of more than two minutes between games and sets.

In football, by contrast, the action only lasts for 90 minutes — with a quarter-hour break in the middle — and there are also plenty of opportunities within a game for players to take some time out and rest.

Tennis is also extremely mentally demanding, with the "me versus you" nature of the sport and the brief gaps between points providing immense psychological pressures (imagine the pressure of having to serve at 30-40 with Federer or Nadal at the other end of the court...). To withstand those kinds of stresses requires enormous reserves of mental fortitude and concentration, which can only really be replicated in football by the pressure situation of taking a penalty.

However, I believe that Messi comes out on top because he plays a team sport, and therefore requires an additional set of skills to those required in a solo sport like tennis.

Messi possesses the same kind of mesmerising individual ability and mental strength as Djokovic. But he also has an uncanny understanding of movement and team dynamics — qualities that Djokovic never has to display.

Messi’s combination of individual brilliance and spatial awareness were vividly on display when he created Barcelona’s opening goal in their Copa del Rey second-leg thriller against Real Madrid on Wednesday night.

First we had the demonstration of physical genius as Messi received possession near the halfway line and dribbled at speed towards the Madrid goal, drawing defenders towards him and skipping past them with ease, the ball seemingly attached to his left boot.

But then came the moment that marks out Messi as a greater player than instinctive performers such as Cristiano Ronaldo or Carlos Tevez, and a more rounded sportsman than a solo artist like Djokovic: the pass to Pedro, who was lurking unmarked to the left of the penalty area after the entire Madrid defence attempted to close down Messi.

The pass was released at precisely the right moment, with precisely the right amount of pace on the ball and at precisely the right angle. All Pedro had to do was stay calm and steer the ball into the net, which he accomplished with style.

Messi’s run-and-pass was a sublime piece of sporting action, and more worthy of praise for its blend of solo brilliance and selfless teamwork than any of Ronaldo’s double-stepover, toe-tap, chop-and-dragback dribbles followed by the inevitable missile shot.

Running fast with a football and then kicking it really hard, à la Ronaldo, is one thing; running fast with a football and then possessing the composure, awareness, selflessness and ability to release a teammate with a subtly stroked pass, à la Messi, is quite another.

And that’s also why, in my view, Messi is a greater sportsman than Djokovic. The Serb may well have those talents for intelligent and perceptive teamwork in equal measure, but the nature of his sport means that we’ll never know.

Beyond those two, I don’t think there’s anyone else who should be considered for the title of the world’s greatest sportsman. Usain Bolt is a phenomenal athlete but, let’s be honest, all he does is run — he runs faster than anyone in the history of the human race, admittedly, but his sphere of activity is rather more limited than Djokovic or Messi.

Maybe Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar is also worthy of a mention for his fluidity and achingly elegant grace, but batting — even for a full day in a Test match — is a less physically demanding task than running around a tennis court for five sets, or being chased and kicked by Real Madrid’s horribly violent defender Pepe for 90 minutes.

There is, I accept, a question mark against Messi due to his relatively poor performances on the international stage. Argentina haven’t even come close to winning a major honour since taking the Olympic gold in 2008, and Messi has rarely been able to inspire his team in the same way that he routinely does with Barcelona (and in the way that Diego Maradona for his country in the mid-Eighties).

So, perhaps, if Messi continues to fail on the international stage and Djokovic becomes a world-beater in the doubles format of his sport, I might change my mind. But, for now, I believe Messi is the greatest.

* The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist.