  Many pundits and fans ask themselves the same question: Which football player
bears most resemblance to Lionel Messi? Is it Chelsea's Eden Hazard? Is it
Paulo Dybala, the heir to Messi in the national team of Argentina? Or is the
most alike player to Messi someone completely else? In general, the research on
the evaluation of players' performances originated in the context of baseball
in the USA, but, currently, it is of great importance in almost every team
sport on the planet. Specifically, football clubs' managers can use the data on
player's similarity when looking for replacement of their players by other,
presumably similar ones. Also, the research in the presented direction is
certainly interesting both for football pundits and football fans. Therefore,
the aim of this study is to answer the question from the title with the use of
the statistical analysis based on the data from ongoing league season retrieved
from WhoScored (WS) database. WS provides detailed data (up to 24 parameters
such as goals scored, the number of assists, shots on goal, passes, dribbles or
fouls) for players of TOP 5 European leagues, and ranks them with respect to
their overall performance. For this study, 17 parameters (criteria) most
relevant for an attacking player were used, and a set of 28 players, candidates
to be 'most alike to Messi' from WS TOP 100 list were selected. After data
normalization and application of a proper metric function the most similar
player to Lionel Messi was found.
