Big and tall footballer that’s technically great

RoyH1

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How tall was Bergkamp? 1.85 or thereabouts? His technique was exquisite
 

Jacob

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Ibra and Berba are the two that springs to mind. Berba was so silky!
 

GazTheLegend

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There is literally hundreds of these types of footballers.

It’s a lazy sentence that shit pundits and Neanderthals roll out ‘oooohhh, he’s got a great touch for a big man’
It's fairly lazy but anyone that plays football knows that the stereotypes tend to hold true for a reason. Maybe it's a developmental thing - if you're bigger and stronger from ages 9-16 than your peers it's easier to be naturally better than others whereas smaller players growing up learn to become extra precise in their technique. I'm sure there's a footballer - think it was Scott McTominay who spoke out recently who said he was "small" relatively speaking growing up, who then suddenly had a growth spurt of 10-12 inches, I may be thinking of Haaland as well. Neither of those you might consider technical players - but they HAVE to be in the top 0.012% of all footballers technically, after all, they're playing at a Champions League level.
 

OleBoiii

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Where do we draw the line? As a Norwegian I don't think you should be considered "tall" before you approach 190 cm, although I know some people around the world consider 180 cm to be tall.

If we draw the line at 185 cm then the list will be endless. C.Ronaldo and Beckham are both tall enough then, for instance.
 

Polar

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Make sense to draw the line at 185cm ;)
Zidane (185cm),
Kaka (186cm),
Casemiro (185cm)
Bale (185cm)
Beckham isn’t 185cm by the way.
 
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Gio

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Socrates (193) and Ibrahimovic (195) the most obvious examples, but a few others not mentioned so far - Van Basten (188), Veron (186), Rivaldo (186), Asparuhov (186), Brian Laudrup (186), Henry (188), Zidane (185), Waddle (187), Busquets (189), Kaka (186), Van Hanegem (186). Maybe not in the same ballpark as some of the others, but still boasting impressive technique for their position include Vieira (192) and Velasquez (188).
 

OleBoiii

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Seeing all the 185-186 cm mentions in here is so weird to me. I never realised that I'd be considered a tall player if I played professionally :p
 

jeff_goldblum

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Is 1.78m (5ft 10) regarded as tall? Then most players in the game are ”tall”.

Ryan Giggs is 1.79m for example, Cantona 1.88m.

The discussion should be 1.90+, Gullit’s a great example.
A recent study (can't find from when but must be last few years as it mentions Pep at City manager) says 182.1cm.(5' 11.5") is average height for a footballer these days. So yeah, to be unusually tall in football you'd have to be 1.90 (6' 3")+.

Apparently average footballer height has increased since the 90s, so Cantona probably would have been considered 'a big man' at the time.
 

Withnail

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So basically from the comments... lots and lots of players

/thread


Seeing all the 185-186 cm mentions in here is so weird to me. I never realised that I'd be considered a tall player if I played professionally :p
As Jeff explains below most people are giving examples of average or slightly above average height football players. The OP means players who are well above average for a PL footballer.

Then there's the whole doubt about the veracity of internet height records. As someone said the other day Luke Shaw is supposedly 5cm taller than Phil Jones but check out any picture of the two of them and Jones is considerably taller.

A recent study (can't find from when but must be last few years as it mentions Pep at City manager) says 182.1cm.(5' 11.5") is average height for a footballer these days. So yeah, to be unusually tall in football you'd have to be 1.90 (6' 3")+.

Apparently average footballer height has increased since the 90s, so Cantona probably would have been considered 'a big man' at the time.
 

DWelbz19

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Its not about Technical ability, its how quick his feet is. There are players like Zlatan, Berbatov who are very good technical players but Pogba is so good when it comes to dribbling and quick change of direction.
Yep. Gullit and Pogba are the only real examples so far. To people saying “is this really so rare?” — well, yeah...? There’s not a player who’s 6’3+ who dribbles anywhere near as well as Pogba does.

It’s stuff like this (just randomly searched for, because there’s genuinely hundreds of examples)

 

Glorio

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  • Arsenal's Kanu back in the day - so languid and very very deceptive
  • Yaya Toure - Unplayable when up for it
  • Berbatov - Enough said
  • Viera - another one who's technique gets overlooked because folks just remember a hard man and a leader.
  • Rodrigo Possebon - looked to be on his way before the unfortunate injury ( I may be overselling his height though considering he mostly played amongst kids)
  • Have to mention Crouch just because he was so awkwardly tall and still had very good technique - maybe not as great as some, but I think because of how tall he was, that was very impressive
 

Tallis

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Does anyone have the portion of successful take ons for Pogba vs some of his contemporaries like Modric, Grealish, Pedri
 

JPRouve

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Once again Benzema is ignored...

 

snk123

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Once again Benzema is ignored...
Benzema is the same height as Zidane and many others. What the OP is looking for (for some weird fetish I presume) is players who are 2 inches taller than Benzema or Zidane i.e. 6ft 3+.

I really don't get these threads - for one, not many players are 6ft 3inches +.. Also, many players are not highly technical anyway regardless of height. So basically height has feck all to do with how technical you can be - it's not like you're taller so you see a ball from a greater distance therefore your touch and dribbling has to be shit. :nono:
 

OnlyTwoDaSilvas

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Haaland. He's a strange one, his build and posture make him look a bit gangly and awkward, but his touch and technique are excellent. Perhaps not quite the dribbler Pogba is (though still very good!) but his touch, weight of pass, and strike are all top class. He's great at picking lofted passes out of the air, usually with a Zlatan-like flying kick.
 

do.ob

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Jan Koller was a fairly decent footballer for someone who was over 2 meters tall and probably weighed over 100kg. Considering CBs are usually around 1.90m tall I wouldn't put players like Benzema or Lewandowski into this category, they aren't exactly huge for a no9.
 

JPRouve

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Seeing all the 185-186 cm mentions in here is so weird to me. I never realised that I'd be considered a tall player if I played professionally :p
You would be above average and definitely a tall player.
 

Rektsanwalt

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Considering the average height for field players is 181cm, I'd say that everything below 105% of the average (which is around 190cm) should not be considered tall in the sense of the topic we are talking about.

Edit:

To clarify, imo OP looks for football players which are so tall that being that tall is a somehow outstanding factor when describing such player. Looking at Lewandowski and the likes, I'd never say that he's a tall player.
 

KirkDuyt

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On Pogba:


Others i can think of are Gullit, Cruyff, who else??
Not many for recent players (CRonaldo, Grealish?). They all sacrifice their height points on skills/techniques.
I know we're a tall people in general, but Cruyff was in no way a tall man. 1m78, that's basically a leprechaun here.
 

Maagge

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Is it not more a case of Pogba simultaneously looking the strongest player on the pitch and the most technically gifted?
While someone like Berbatov had great technique he wasn't really someone who would physically bully anyone very often.
 

The holy trinity 68

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On Pogba:


Others i can think of are Gullit, Cruyff, who else??
Not many for recent players (CRonaldo, Grealish?). They all sacrifice their height points on skills/techniques.
Cruyff was only 5 foot 10, it's not exactly tall, it's average height for western males, Grealish is 5 foot 9.

Ronaldo and Gullit I agree with though. I would say Peter Crouch, he wasn't world class obviously but he was a very technically sound player and was surprisingly skillful for 6 foot 7. He is probably the most skillful player I have seen for his height, he just looked awkward when he was dribbling because he is so tall.
 

JPRouve

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I'm definitely adding the word "tall man" to my resume.
If you are 185cm, you are at least 10 cm taller than the average man, so you are definitely tall. Not freakishly tall but still tall.
 

JPRouve

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Not in the Netherlands he ain’t.
We are not talking about just Netherlands though? And even then the average is 182, so even then he is on the tall side of the spectrum if he is 185.