Yeah. The only thing set in stone is that Messi, Maradona, and Pele are the top 3. Whether Ronaldo ranks 4th of 7th is up to debate. A lot of people rank Cryuff and Co. higher.
Rank Maradona, Messi, Pele and Ronaldo
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Yeah. The only thing set in stone is that Messi, Maradona, and Pele are the top 3. Whether Ronaldo ranks 4th of 7th is up to debate. A lot of people rank Cryuff and Co. higher.
For me there was a Tier 1 that consisted of Pele and Maradona. Now that Tier has 3, with the third obvious choice being Messi.
Ronalod probaly wont make second Tier after these 3 greats.
Ronalod probaly wont make second Tier after these 3 greats.
Most welcome. It is definitely not a good way to compare players in different eras.
Rules didn't stop Stanley Matthews from beating him to the first award despite being 10 years older at 41
Thanks for sharing the table, (as you said) if goal contributions play a big factor in how you rate a player then you cant downplay Puskas' career.
Who is the Goat?
All of them!
...and Puskas, Di Stefano, Eusebio, Garrincha, Cruyff, Beckenbauer, Moore, Best, Gerd Müller, Platini, Zico, Laudrup, Baggio, Romario, Zidane, Ronaldinho, Maldini, Baresi, Sammer, Van Basten, Figo, Bergkamp, Ibrahimovic, Cantona, Rivaldo or a keeper. Schmeichel, Buffon, Neuer, Casillas or even Kahn.
What are the criterias? Goals? Assists? Wins? Influence in the teams? Tackles? Titles?
People like Giggs, Weah, Best or Lewandowski never had a chance of winning a World Cup. Does that make them lesser players? No.
It is apples and oranges.
Beckenbauer said: The best player of the 50s was Di Stefano, Pele in the 60s, Cruyff in the 70s, Maradona in the 80s and Laudrup in the 90s.
Ronaldo, Zidane, Messi, Platini, Zico and Puskas are probably on par with those.
That is my opinion, but again. Where are the keepers and the defenders? It is apples & oranges.
All of them!
...and Puskas, Di Stefano, Eusebio, Garrincha, Cruyff, Beckenbauer, Moore, Best, Gerd Müller, Platini, Zico, Laudrup, Baggio, Romario, Zidane, Ronaldinho, Maldini, Baresi, Sammer, Van Basten, Figo, Bergkamp, Ibrahimovic, Cantona, Rivaldo or a keeper. Schmeichel, Buffon, Neuer, Casillas or even Kahn.
What are the criterias? Goals? Assists? Wins? Influence in the teams? Tackles? Titles?
People like Giggs, Weah, Best or Lewandowski never had a chance of winning a World Cup. Does that make them lesser players? No.
It is apples and oranges.
Beckenbauer said: The best player of the 50s was Di Stefano, Pele in the 60s, Cruyff in the 70s, Maradona in the 80s and Laudrup in the 90s.
Ronaldo, Zidane, Messi, Platini, Zico and Puskas are probably on par with those.
That is my opinion, but again. Where are the keepers and the defenders? It is apples & oranges.
Pele
Maradona
Messi
Ronaldo
Maradona
Messi
Ronaldo
Pelé is the template, complete skillet (passing, shooting, ball control, dribbling, tricks, heading, strong with both feet, pace and power). On top of this incredible skill set he has the trophy cabinet, records and background story to finish it all off.
Well, Messi did well to win the world cup in an otherwise ordinary team as the main protagonist and the player of the tournament at the age of 35.
Ronaldo scored a good number of goals last season in a handful of games but when he he did not score, he was a liability with his lack of pressing and lack of creativity. This season he was simply very very poor.
For me personally, there was never a debate. The eye test was sufficient to determine who the better player was although I very much respect Ronaldo and consider him an all time great for his individual and collective achievements.
1. Messi
2. Pele = Maradona
.
4. Ronaldo Nazario
5. Cronaldo
2. Pele = Maradona
.
4. Ronaldo Nazario
5. Cronaldo
That is a lie.
No, it's an opinion
No, that was politics. They gave it to Matthews to get the english on board with the award, and motivated it as a career achievement
Ronaldo you must be talking about Ronaldo phenomeno
if you meant Cristiano then this is nothing but a joke
if you meant Cristiano then this is nothing but a joke
Interesting. Did he really stand out from the rest during that time or was he amongst the group of the best?
Tier 1: Messi/Pele/Maradona
...
Tier 2: Beckenbauer/Cruyff
...
Tier 3: DiStefano/Puskas/Best/Zidane/C.Ronaldo/Ronaldo/G.Müller/Platini/Matthäus/Maldini/Baresi
Tried to rank them according to their overall influence on the game and of course relative to the eras they played in (can't objectively compare football from the 70s to modern football).
The thing with Cristiano is - he's a great striker, but simply not as influential/important for his teams like a lot of the others were. You saw it with Real: He left and they did just a short reload window and were back to being a dominant side and winning the CL again last year. When he left United back in 2009, United was still an absolute force up until Fergie left (league titles, CL final etc.).
Cristiano owns most of his success to his insane work ethic and the athleticism he achieved at his prime due to it. Once it (naturally) faded, his play went south in a hurry, too. Most of those other players were more "pure footballers". Messi doesn't have the intial quickness he once had either, but he's just so good in many other areas, that it doesn't matter nearly as much as it does for Cristiano.
...
Tier 2: Beckenbauer/Cruyff
...
Tier 3: DiStefano/Puskas/Best/Zidane/C.Ronaldo/Ronaldo/G.Müller/Platini/Matthäus/Maldini/Baresi
Tried to rank them according to their overall influence on the game and of course relative to the eras they played in (can't objectively compare football from the 70s to modern football).
The thing with Cristiano is - he's a great striker, but simply not as influential/important for his teams like a lot of the others were. You saw it with Real: He left and they did just a short reload window and were back to being a dominant side and winning the CL again last year. When he left United back in 2009, United was still an absolute force up until Fergie left (league titles, CL final etc.).
Cristiano owns most of his success to his insane work ethic and the athleticism he achieved at his prime due to it. Once it (naturally) faded, his play went south in a hurry, too. Most of those other players were more "pure footballers". Messi doesn't have the intial quickness he once had either, but he's just so good in many other areas, that it doesn't matter nearly as much as it does for Cristiano.
I think you're seriously over rating pele here, he'll be up there obviously but to say it would be by far is a stretch.
Matthews? He didn't stand out, Di Stefano was clearly better by then and did stand out from the rest, Matthews was in his 40s by then iirc. It was a very different time where the european cup wasn't as important to the award and there was a real push to avoid giving it to the same player in consecutive years
I mean obviously hyperbole
Messi.. >Maradona>Ronaldo >Pele.
Pele is overrated. Played worldcups while on Santos low intensity calendar. Not great dribbling skills by today standards.
Pele is overrated. Played worldcups while on Santos low intensity calendar. Not great dribbling skills by today standards.
I got a list, here's the order of my list that its in. It goes Messi, Pele, Maradona and Ronnie, Cristiano from Saudi, Cruyff, 'Dinho, Zizou and Ben Mee
As an opinion, it is an exaggeration at best. From the little I've seen, it simply isn't true when it is in comparison to Messi and Maradona.
Thing is, there are no once in generation athletes who are best at everything. Pele was extremely talented (Messi of his era) while also being a great athlete (Ronaldo of his era). But this he jumped 5 meters, was faster than light and killed Gozilla are just myths. No one can be like that. Jordan jumped higher than anyone but was not the fastest and the strongest. Ali had the quickest hands but not the heaviest punch and was not the strongest. Even Ronaldo is neither the fastest, strongest or jumps highest but was great at all of these. Same for Pele.
I think this is fair. Messi, Maradona and Pele in the first tier, with Cruyff, Ronaldo, Di Stefano and Beckenbauer in the next one. The order within the tier to a large degree being very subjective.
Im discovering more about pele from this thread than i originally knew. Its a shame that so much of the footage is black and white and grainy. To have been able to watch brasil 1970 as it happen, that would have been something.
Ive always had a soft spot for maradonna as hes what i remember as a child, mexico 1986 being the first world cup i could remember and understand what was going on.
So pele
I need to find an article or two about why laudrup was the best player of the 1990s. A few people and outlets have said this.
gee you can't make this sh*t upIf you don’t care avout longevity then surely Nani is up there with the greats too, right? A lot of the footballers would only dream to do what Nani did in his best games. But there’s no one rating Nani that high so longevity must be important, ain’t it?
Sorry meant di stefano since you are madrid fan.
Maradona
Pele
Cruyff
Mesi
Ronaldo
Pele
Cruyff
Mesi
Ronaldo
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idioticI agree the point on Ronaldinho.
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He wasn't, a beutiful player to watch though which probably has inflated his reputation in recent years.
A ton of players were better than him like say romario , barresi or Ronaldo.
You need to read more.
Nah, he was definitely one of the best, they're weren't a 'ton' of players better than him at all
I did, that's how I know
Yeah, I think most would agree that Matthews was a "political" decision and/or some kind of "lifetime achievement" thing.
He obviously wasn't the best player in the word at 41.
That said, he still played (and continued to do so for years after the award) - and at a high level too. Matthews was a health nut (I suppose you could say) and subjected himself to a much stricter regime (both training and diet) than your average player at the time.
A bit of an exaggerations but he definitely wasn't the best either.
Great chart, interesting to see puskas having a higher goals/assist output than Pele. So the bletcher report article i posted a few days ago, that said puskas was the best player of the 60s and not Pele makes more sense.The award didn’t exist until they were in their 30s. Chances are they’d have won a few more each had it existed earlier.
I do find the airbrushing of Puskas from these debates a little odd. Dominated the game at every level he had an opportunity to influence. He’s not in my top 3 but his case for a spot in that second tier deserves a fairer hearing.
He’s also in that creative sweet-spot occupied by Messi, Pele and Cruyff where he can score and create heavily. To speak in the statistical language that has dominated much of these threads, Puskas has racked up a similar balance of goals to assists as those two players. Throughout his career he consistently scored a goal per game and assisted once every two games. A few players have come close to that goalscoring ratio and a couple have approachedthat assist ratio. But nobody has ever been able to do both at such a productive rate.
Now there are plenty of caveats and context to those figures. But if these sorts of numbers weigh heavily in how you rank your greats, then Puskas really should be in your thinking.
I think i really do need to find a good book that covers the career of the likes of puskas, di stefano and gusieppe meazza.
Its a shame that WW2 happen when it did as italy didnt get a chance to defend their back to back WC triumphs of 34 and 38. How different would have football history been if Meazza had been the player to win 3 WC's (and consectuively), before Pele won his three.
Yeah, sure.
But then again, if Italy hadn't been allowed to kick the shit out of Austria in '34...another story again.
There are many "what ifs" over the years.
ETA An obvious one being: what if England and Scotland had participated in the pre-war WCs?
Di Stefano took a midtable team and turned it into the dominant force of european football. He was a monster at River Plate, the best player in South America to the point of being the biggest transfer in the world when he moved to Millionarios in Colombia, where he was once again the best player in the world, then he moved to Europe and for several years, from him late 20s to early 30s was still by far the best player in the continent
Yeah, it was a case of "we want the british to give legitimacy to this award, Matthews is widely recognized as either the best or one of the best players of all time, and the best british player of all time, and if the award was around in his heyday he would certainly have won it a few times, so let's give it to him to recognise his historical greatness and significance to the sport, and make the brits happy in the process"