How good was Claude Makelele ?

gajender

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Kanté isn't a DM, Deschamps, the midfield version of Desailly or karembeu would be better comparisons. I'm always confused by the link that people make with Kanté.
Agreed asking Kante to be sitting Dm takes away his best attributes and isn't the best way to utilise him.
 

JPRouve

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Let's be honest, they're both little, black, french-speaking and play/played for Chelsea in midfield. That's why they get compared.

Lukaku & Drogba get similarly compared.
Lukaku-Drogba is just daft but with Kanté-Makélélé maybe people mainly see Kanté's defensive highlights, he is also a solid passer that regularly tries long passes and through balls with both feet and he likes to drive forward too. He is more like a better version of Matuidi and even then it's not a great comparison. While Makélélé was at his best a minimalist, he would play very simply but with extreme efficiency, he had good technique and was able to do a little bit more but it was rare.
 

harms

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Some players are just not made for YouTube compilations :) It's a bit weird to see one that starts with his dribbling runs and attempts to score and not something that he was actually great at.

I think he got overrated lately — because of the comments like Zidane's or Hierro's and the boring "he was so good they named the role after him". Yes, Real shouldn't have sold him and Chelsea got a fantastic addition to their squad, but the biggest mistake that Real made was not replacing him with a similar type of midfielder. That said, even though he has nothing on Rijkaard, he won't look out of place in any team aside from Pep's Barca, perhaps, as they required a completely different skillset from their anchorman.
 

Mb194dc

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04/05 Chelsea side had joint best defense in English top flight history.

More impressive considering rule changes for pass backs, 3 points for a win etc, (since Preston also only conceded 15 in 19th century.)

Makelele was the key midfielder in that team. Counter attacking 4 3 3.

Pretty hard to argue against him being the best ever playing that position.

Also my favourite Chelsea side, shame Robben could only play 30 mins of CL second leg or maybe we win CL too.
 

thepolice123

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Some players are just not made for YouTube compilations :) It's a bit weird to see one that starts with his dribbling runs and attempts to score and not something that he was actually great at.

I think he got overrated lately — because of the comments like Zidane's or Hierro's and the boring "he was so good they named the role after him". Yes, Real shouldn't have sold him and Chelsea got a fantastic addition to their squad, but the biggest mistake that Real made was not replacing him with a similar type of midfielder. That said, even though he has nothing on Rijkaard, he won't look out of place in any team aside from Pep's Barca, perhaps, as they required a completely different skillset from their anchorman.
Their biggest mistake was probably firing Del Bosque. That was the beginning of the end.

After that was a just string of terrible transfer decisions that crippled the team. They also didn't find a proper replacement for Hierro who left around the same time as Makelele.
 

Schmeichel's Cartwheel

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Not many players get a position named after them, so I'm gonna say pretty damn good.

We should have bought him in 2003.
 

harms

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04/05 Chelsea side had joint best defense in English top flight history.

More impressive considering rule changes for pass backs, 3 points for a win etc, (since Preston also only conceded 15 in 19th century.)

Makelele was the key midfielder in that team. Counter attacking 4 3 3.

Pretty hard to argue against him being the best ever playing that position.
Ehm :lol: It's really not. In the Premier League (considering the lack of a competition, since the likes of Keane/Vieira played differently) — perhaps.

I'd also say that Terry, Carvalho and Cech had more impact on that defensive record, although that you can argue with.
 

BBRBB

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What kind of impact Claude had at PSG by the way ? Was he as good as with Madrid and Chelsea or he had declined a bit ?
He joined at 36 and ended at 38 so obviously wasn't at his peak but was still valuable with PSG almost qualifying for CL in his second season.
 

Makelele

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What made him truly special imo is that he almost never had a bad game. He was always in and always contributing positively. In all his years at Chelsea I can only remember one game he was average. I believe against Charlton. That’s it. And that speaks volumes.
 

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He was probably the best Makelele-type player of his era.
 

Kamprad

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Never really got the appreciation he deserved until Real sold him and everyone could see the negative effect it had on the team. One of the worst transfer decisions in modern top football.
 

Demyanenko_square_jaw

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I first saw him at Celta, who i was following every week with Mostovoi and Karpin there.

He formed part of a great midfield with Mostovoi, Karpin, Mazinho and Revivo which was imo as good as any in the league at the time, but did not have the quality in the rest of the team or enough depth to compete for the title.

Though i considered him an excellent defensive midfielder i actually thought he was the worst and least interesting of the group. Mazinho was playing the very last top level season of his career when Makelele came and much less mobile, but was still equally effective a DM with his great positioning, decision making and notably superior passing. Mostovoi and Karpin tied everything together and were the ones that really elevated the team with their technique, vision, midfield dictating qualities and Karpin's almost Nedved level workrate from the right wing and into midfield. Revivo was a lazy mercenary take one game off from every three sort of player that never fulfilled his potential, but had an excellent Ginola-like two footed winger skillset and was mostly playing very well these seasons before he took the money from Fenerbahce and faded into obscurity.

Makelele in this company was in all honesty a bit dull and though playing his holding role (alongside Mazinho for the first season) very well was certainly not the man that made it all hold together or the most talented. His leaving didn't have any impact on mostovoi/karpin's ability to run a midfield on very competitive terms with the other top end of the league la liga teams.

He went on to a great career and vital role with Real Madrid, Chelsea (where is style was perfect fit with Mourinho tactics) and eventually France, can't really add anything more there than what has already been said, but i feel it is worth pointing out his vestigial organ status at the excellent Celta midfield as a counterpoint to a lot of the mythmaking around his career as being that of someone who was vital in binding together a midfield that contained such attacking players as Zidane, Raul, Ronaldo and Figo. imo from watching Real at the time, while he was undeniably important it was at least as much the case in that team dropping off a level that those players were starting to decline and become more inconsistent circa 2002/2003 anyway.

Overall i agree with Invictus and Harms takes on him, excellent player that has some over the top myths around him like the creating a new style thing.
 

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He was very good at Celta aswell in the late 90s.

Obviously proved his worth at Madrid and Chelsea, looking back at that period Arsenal would've won more titles and possibly CL if they'd signed him instead of Chelsea in that period.

To show how good he was in same summer Real Madrid signed Flavio Conceicao to be competition in central midfield. At the time he had 44 caps for Brazil and been big part of Deportivo winning La Liga that season, didn't really make much of an impact at Real Madrid and just got loaned out.
 

ivaldo

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He was like, really, really good.
 

FootballHQ

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He was something else really. I was young so I dont know if I'm just exaggerating the past but the.guy literally shaped the role of a modern DM. One of the best DMs ever.
I think what changed was acceptance in English football that 4-3-3/4-5-1 could be very effective formation in premier league if you had a really strong DM.

Think back to that time and the top teams like Arsenal, Man. United and Liverpool were all still playing 4-4-2. Nowadays Roy Keane would probably be moulded into pure DM but back then he was box to box as was Nicky Butt and whoever else was picked in that position. Same for Arsenal options like Vieria.

After he arrived Liverpool picked up Mascherano, another big player in the pure DM role over last decade in football.
 

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A monster.

One of the greatest DMs ever. Game reading, ball-winning, positioning, interceptions, tackling, there was nothing in his position he couldn't do and he did better than anyone. So good that you wouldn't even notice him. His short passing was good and he was the heart of any team he played for, dictating the tempo, allowing the attacking players to shine and the defenders to have a break.

Phenomenal player who definitely put his stamp on the game and an inspiration for many midfielders. A shame he didn't get a trophy with his NT.
 
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RooneyLegend

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He was the best at defending in the holding mid role in football history. Nothing and no one got by him. On the ball he was nothing special, just did the basics well.

One of the issue's at Madrid was that he had effectively replaced Redondo who in that role was great at pretty much everything. That made them think he really wasn't up to much.
 

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If we’d signed him instead of Veron, perhaps from Celta a year earlier, we’d maybe have another CL and PL in the cabinet. A Makele-Keane-Scholes trio would have been perfect.
 

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If we’d signed him instead of Veron, perhaps from Celta a year earlier, we’d maybe have another CL and PL in the cabinet. A Makele-Keane-Scholes trio would have been perfect.
I’ never thought of that trio.

That’s an unstoppable midfield.
 

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The only person who really undervalued makhelele was Perez.He said makhelele is a player who only knows short passes. And all his short passes are sideways or backwards .He is a player that Madrid fans would easily and quickly forget.
 

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He was pretty good. Not as good as Mauro Silva though.
 

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He was the best at defending in the holding mid role in football history. Nothing and no one got by him. On the ball he was nothing special, just did the basics well.

One of the issue's at Madrid was that he had effectively replaced Redondo who in that role was great at pretty much everything. That made them think he really wasn't up to much.
Redondo was one of a kind, one of the first deep lying playmakers, but when you got Zidane, Figo, Ronaldo, Guti, Raùl on the attacking front, you should be able to accommodate with a strict DM, especially when he's called Makelele. It was a big mistake to let him go. Zidane was reportedly upset when Madrid refused to give him an improved contract and bought Becks, saying "Why put another layer of gold paint on the Bentley when you are losing the entire engine?"
 

Moby

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Kanté isn't a DM, Deschamps, the midfield version of Desailly or karembeu would be better comparisons. I'm always confused by the link that people make with Kanté.
Still the point stands that France has produced some of the best defensive midfielders (Destroyers, Holding Midfielders, Defensive Box to Box midfielders, etc): Luis Fernandez, Jean Tigana, Marcel Desailly, Didier Deschamps, Emmanuel Petit, Patrick Vieira, Claude Makelele, Ngolo Kante, Blaise Matuidi off the top of my head and I may be missing some.

That's an outstanding list of midfielders and would be one of the best comparing to most other countries.
 

TheeAma12

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Still the point stands that France has produced some of the best defensive midfielders (Destroyers, Holding Midfielders, Defensive Box to Box midfielders, etc): Luis Fernandez, Jean Tigana, Marcel Desailly, Didier Deschamps, Emmanuel Petit, Patrick Vieira, Claude Makelele, Ngolo Kante, Blaise Matuidi off the top of my head and I may be missing some.

That's an outstanding list of midfielders and would be one of the best comparing to most other countries.
Looking at France overall as a football nation it has produced some of the best players in history i believe only Germany,Netherlands and maybe Spain can claim to have produced consistent generations of great footballers.
 

BlackShark_80

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Looking at France overall as a football nation it has produced some of the best players in history i believe only Germany,Netherlands and maybe Spain can claim to have produced consistent generations of great footballers.
disagree about Spain for me Italy, Brazil, and Argentina are more consistent than them
 

RooneyLegend

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Redondo was one of a kind, one of the first deep lying playmakers, but when you got Zidane, Figo, Ronaldo, Guti, Raùl on the attacking front, you should be able to accommodate with a strict DM, especially when he's called Makelele. It was a big mistake to let him go. Zidane was reportedly upset when Madrid refused to give him an improved contract and bought Becks, saying "Why put another layer of gold paint on the Bentley when you are losing the entire engine?"
Redondo was one of a kind, one of the first deep lying playmakers, but when you got Zidane, Figo, Ronaldo, Guti, Raùl on the attacking front, you should be able to accommodate with a strict DM, especially when he's called Makelele. It was a big mistake to let him go. Zidane was reportedly upset when Madrid refused to give him an improved contract and bought Becks, saying "Why put another layer of gold paint on the Bentley when you are losing the entire engine?"
The big mistake imo was not replacing him. My point still stands though, after years of watching Redondo, you'd think Makelele is a mediocre player.
 

B20

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Overrated.

He was world class at what he did, but his stature was greatly increased by the myths spun around him incidentally playing in a hugely loopsided Real Madrid team having to be the one holding it together defensively and then them not bothering to sign a proper replacement. There were other defensive midfielders around who could do similar jobs, if not to quite the same standard, then not far off, such as Hamann, Simeone and Davids (the latter two also much better on the ball).

Can't be compared to proper holding midfield greats like Desailly, Rijkaard, Vieira, Redondo or Souness.
 

Robertd0803

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Was one of the best buys in Premier League history. Insanely good. So good the role is named after him.
 

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Staggeringly good player, and responsible for a significant part of our success back then. Fortress Stamford Bridge was in no small part down to his efforts.
 

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He made the defensive mdf position become invaluable in the EPL, not only because of his defensive duties, but also because the quality of his game to start the play from behind.

To be fair, he succeeded Fernando Redondo who was also insanely good on this kindo of def midf role, but had a career wrecking injury too soon.
 

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I thought in the early 2000s he was a very boring, limited player who was lucky to get into such a great team as Real's. Once he'd moved to Chelsea and I saw him more regularly I realised what a clueless lil bitch I'd been and started appreciating his style of play. One of the best at breaking up play I've seen and beguiling dynamic as a passer but also as a dribbler into the opponent's half.
 

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Hugely effective. But gets a lot more kudos compared to others who have performed the same function just as well because Real became so lopsided and English football was still obsessed with 4-4-2.