Lionel Messi's role at Barcelona will inevitably change over the course of the next few years, as he begins to wind down a glorious career.

Since he first stepped on to a pitch 10 years ago, the Argentine has been destined for greatness and, in many respects, is the complete modern-day player.

Not content to showcase a vast array of dazzling skills, as we saw in the 87th minute against Espanyol at the weekend when already 5-1 to the good, Messi was still happy to chase down a lost ball and win it back.

Lionel Messi's hat-trick against Espanyol means he has has 202 goals in 182 games. Cristiano Ronaldo has 200 in 178. http://t.co/Qt29Pf7FMj

It's just such a work ethic which endears him to football fans everywhere, not just in Catalonia.

What marks him out from his contemporaries, aside from an incessant rate of goals and assists, is the ability to play in a variety of positions and not look out of place in any of them.

Nominally not a striker, and certainly no target man, Messi has been playing a variant of a centre-forward role and out-scored anyone else who has played there in La Liga before.

Out wide on the right doesn't appear to have curtailed his potency either. His quick feet and sharp footballing brain mean there is an omnipresent threat whether Messi chooses to come inside and trade passes, or if he goes on a more circuitous route to goal.

The false-nine role that Barcelona made popular during the Pep Guardiola era would appear to have been created just for the Argentine.

The sheer audacity of it. Putting out a team without a recognised striker and still managing to pummel most into submission thanks to the excellence of your talisman.

At the present time, Messi is in his prime as a footballer. In five years, he will be 32, and while past his best, there is surely no doubt he will have much to offer.

With the explosive bursts that are as much part of his game as the goals he scores a less regular occurrence at that age, we can expect Messi to sit a little further back than normal.

Perhaps more of the No. 10 role that he plays for Argentina and where he has begun to be utilised by Barca should the tactical pattern dictate.

It's a position that is the fulcrum of many of the top teams, and as one of the very best exponents, Messi will continue to be the conduit through which all of Barca's good work must come.

Ex-Argentina manager Alejandro Sabella agrees that a playmaking role is where we will find Messi later in his career. He told Cope (via Goal.com) earlier this year:

As time passes and he loses that extraordinary, explosive pace, he will become more of a playmaker.

He’s so extraordinary that we only know [him as a goalscorer], but can do so much more.

He is one of the world's great players, and we are lucky to see him week in, week out. He is one of the best players of all time.

His team-mates know that he can win a game, he can help win a match, and his opponents are scared of what he can do to them. He is a decisive, incredible player.

It's unlikely we will find his name on the scoresheet as much as now, but who's to say that in five years' time, Messi hasn't broken virtually every other scoring record in the book?

The No. 10 role is probably the one that suits him best. It allows Messi the freedom to roam, to express and to create.

From a team perspective, the threat comes from further back, giving opposition defences the conundrum of whether to come out and meet Messi head on, thus exposing themselves to the ball over the top, or to sit back and allow him to thread a ball through the eye of the needle.

Against Messi, you're damned if you do either. 

In five years, age may have wearied him and years of playing at the very highest level will have taken a toll on his body, but his brain will still be as razor sharp as ever.

In-game intelligence is a commodity that can't be bought, and it's that which will still see Lionel Messi at the top of the world game in 2019.

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