Messi the hero as Argentina win gold

Lionel Messi insisted all the controversy over his selection for the Olympics had been worth it after he helped Argentina to back-to-back gold medals.

The 21-year-old Barcelona forward has been the player of the tournament and had a leading role in the 1-0 victory over Nigeria in the final in Beijing's Bird's Nest stadium.

But Messi nearly did not come to the tournament - his club Barcelona won a court battle with FIFA over whether they were obliged to release him, but finally consented to allow their player to go to China.

Messi, who set up the only goal of the final for Benfica's Angel di Maria, said: "It was very tough for me to get here, but it has all been worth it.

"Finally, everything has turned out fine even after all the problems people were talking about. But there is no point looking back at all of that now.

"I knew even before I came here that it would be worth it for me."

He added: "This squad deserved this. We all knew when we came here that we may never have anything like this experience again, so we are fortunate that everything went well and we won the gold medal."

Messi scored two goals in the tournament, one against the Ivory Coast and the other against Holland, and he set up a team-mate to score in both games. He also claimed two assists in the 3-0 victory over arch-rivals Brazil in the semi-finals.

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