When the day comes that Lionel Messi retires from football, there's a good chance the Argentine will be widely accepted as the greatest of all time.

As it stands there are still doubts about whether Messi really is the best, with the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Pele, Zinedine Zidane and Brazilian Ronaldo also in the running.

But there's no debating that Messi is the greatest to have ever played in Spain, simply because of the amount of time he's spent there and the amount of trophies he's won.

In his 14 years as a Barcelona first-team player Messi has won nine La Liga titles, the Copa del Rey six times and the Champions League on four occasions.

He's also won five Ballon d'Ors - a feat matched only by his arch nemesis, Ronaldo.

Messi and Ronaldo have fought for the title of world's best player ever since 2008, when the latter won the Ballon d'Or at Manchester United.

Ronaldo joined Real Madrid in 2009 and up until this summer, when he moved to Juventus, the Portuguese sought to prove he's better than Messi in the same league.

Who exactly is superior out of the two is entirely subjective, but La Liga president Javier Tebas has made no bones about who he prefers out of Messi and Ronaldo.

Now that Ronaldo is out of the picture, Tebas has proposed renaming the La Liga Player of the Year award after Messi, who he believes will be recognised as the GOAT when he retires.

"We will have to think about it," said Tebas recently. "I believe that Messi will be the greatest player of all time, even if he isn't already.

"Messi has been playing since he was a kid and always at the absolute top, top level and he never wavers.

"It would be a good idea to create a trophy in the future for the best player of that season that has Messi's name on it."

There's no way Tebas would have said that if Ronaldo was still at Real Madrid, let's face it.

Messi, 31, still has plenty of years at the top left in him, though, so it might be a long time before he has the Player of the Year award named after him.