As great a fan base they enjoy across the globe, Lionel Messi and Neymar Jr. seem to have an equally formidable number of detractors out there, waiting for the slightest of slip-ups to pull them down. A quick peep into the world of football memes in the wake of their largely forgettable performances in the opening matches of their respective teams in the ongoing World Cup confirms this.
With the World Cup getting under way and tournament favourites making stumbling starts to their campaign, the meme factory on social media has gone on an overdrive.
New members
Troll Football Malayalam, a Facebook group for football memes, recorded 3,064 posts evoking 1.60 million responses in the last seven days. About 9.6K members joined the group during the period, taking the total number of active members to 186.3K.
In the lacklustre performance of Messi and Neymar, they had a goldmine to dig and came up with some hilarious gems. Shortly after the former botched up a penalty, he was crowned ‘Miss Penalty’, while another showcased him writing a letter to Cristiano Ronaldo, who, incidentally, converted a penalty with ease against Spain, asking for tips on taking penalty kicks.
But Messi soon receded to the background as Neymar put in a poor performance against Switzerland. Social media literally exploded with memes on how Neymar allegedly went down far too frequently and easily in his duels against Swiss defenders.
One meme had actor Jagathy in his inimitable expression saying how while watching the game on his mobile phone Neymar fell down under the impact of the vibration of an incoming call. Another hilarious meme showcased Messi eventually sleeping in peace as a shell-shocked Neymar sits wide-awake.
However, Vishnu Dev, one of the admins of Troll Football Malayalam, said it was not all about Messi and Neymar alone. Ronaldo’s hat-trick against Spain created quite a stir in the meme world, as well as the performance of underdogs Iceland and Mexico who punched above their weight against mightier opponents Argentina and Germany.
In a classic meme, an Argentine fan is seen ordering a ‘7’-up at the shop of a Brazil fan, alluding to their 7-1 rout at the hands of Germany in the last World Cup, and the shopkeeper responds that he will instead serve ‘ice’-cream, a dig at Argentina drawing with minnows Iceland.
Good following
Memes seem to enjoy quite a good following as well. “No one with a sense of humour can but laugh their heads off at the pun involved and appreciate the effort behind it,” said Subash Balan, an ardent football fan and an executive with Ernst & Young. But Akash, a young football fan, said he was against generating laughs out of an injured player in the form of memes.