Video: Football - Most emotional moments in 2016

2016 was a spectacular year in football. It was full of twists and turns, throwing up unexpected winners, retirements and plenty of beautiful memories. This year consisted of Leicester City improbably winning the Premier League, Lionel Messi suffering heartbreak in the Copa America Centenario and Cristiano Ronaldo spectacularly winning the Euro 2016 title.

The video is full of powerful moments from the beautiful game. It starts off with Schweinsteiger bidding an emotional farewell to the German national team followed by a heartwarming moment of Juan Mata meeting a disabled Manchester United fan on pitchside.

This year also saw Pep Guardiola in tears as he bid farewell to Bundesliga giants Bayern Munich and Zlatan Ibrahimovic getting a hero’s sendoff from a loving Paris Saint-Germain crowd.

However, the video’s two most powerful moments involve the two greatest players our generation, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. While the Portuguese star had tears of joy after fulfilling his lifelong dream of winning a trophy with Portugal, Lionel Messi was left crying in anguish after Argentina fell just short once again in a major final.

It had so much of an impact on the Argentine maestro that he even decided to retire from the game, although he later reversed his decision. On the other side of Ronaldo’s victory, French players were absolutely devastated on losing the final at their home with a particularly poignant moment showing Antoine Griezmann in tears after narrowly losing out to Ronaldo once again in the Euro 2016 final (Griezmann’s Atletico Madrid lost to Ronaldo’s Real Madrid in the Champions League final).

Other notable moments from this video include Neymar’s inspirational role in Brazil’s Olympic gold medal and Fernando Torres looking absolutely heartbroken after missing out on the Champions League medal with his home side Atletico Madrid.

Sit back, enjoy and watch one of the most powerful and emotional videos of 2016. No wonder, football is called the beautiful game.