Coming back to Monti, on phone right now so will put it in short. In his era he was truly peerless. He famously marked the greatest player of his time - Sindelar. That's a massive yardstick to have. If you can successfully dominate the greatest of your generation, it's as far as you can go in stamping your greatness in the history books. That's what all the greats did, it just happens that we can assess recent players a lot more. Anything beyond this is comparing eras, which is impossible to do.
The problem with the stories of that era is that they sound so very, very different depending on from what side you hear them. That Austrian team around Sindelar had so many obstacles. Many of their key players still had to play domestic games during the World Cup tournament, traveling between Italy and Austria or simply missing World Cup games. More than half of the regular starting XI was missing for various reasons including some brutal injuries because the players were kicked in a proper mental way during the qualifiers. The complete coaching team (including the head coach Jimmy Hogan) stayed at home because they couldn't afford to make the trip, so the players were on their own.
Then the semifinal happened. The referee was a guest of Mussolini the night before and reading about the goals for Italy, you simply have to say that he wasn't going to let Austria win, no matter what. According to reports, the ref cleared a great goalscoring chance for Austria by himself, deliberately heading the ball out of the box. I'm pretty sure that it has been proven since that Mussolini paid the referee (who despite the criticism for his performance in the semifinal refereed the final as well and let the Italian midfield kick the shit out of Czechoslovakian team without ever interfering). Greece withdraw from the return leg in the qualifier against Italy after Mussolini paid them a shitload of money.
It's by far the most tainted World Cup ever, way worse than the one in Argentina in '78. And in all that Monti wasn't even the dominating figure for Italy like for example Matthäus was for Germany. Meazza was clearly the star in the team, deciding the game in attack while Monti was part of a brutal midfield kicking quality foreign playmakers until they were injured without any protection from the referee. Sindelar finished that famous marking job injured. But without substitutions allowed, he of course stayed on the pitch till the end. But he wasn't able to play the game for 3rd place or would have been able to play in the final.
Obviously it's difficult to compare between eras, almost impossible and we have to give some leeway in regards to the rules of each era and all that. But I think in the case of Monti's impact on Italy's World Cup win compared to modern examples like Matthäus for Germany or compared to Rijkaard's performances for Milan, Ajax and for the Dutch nationalteam in their Euro win in '88 in a highly competitive time without that kind of influence from outside parties, I think it's pretty mental to suggest that Monti should be rated anywhere near them. I rarely agree with
@Theon (
) but I'm with him here and think you're way off the mark if you think that Monti's performances in the 30's are in any way comparable to the probably two greatest midfielders of all time.