Players that others can rely on to pass the ball to and either get it back from as many times as required to escape a tricky situation or completely calm a game down and restore order from i.e. make aggressive pressing pointless because it will just lead to burnout?
The generation just gone had the best player of all-time at this, whose name I'll leave blank as it should be obvious who it is. It also had at least 5 more players of absolutely world class calibre who did the same for their respective teams.
So, who is out there that can do that in the here and now?
Kroos, Modric and Thiago are hard to argue against as the top 3, the order in which you put them is immaterial, I guess, but after them, does that type of player at that level of quality fall off a cliff? Who else is there? Are there even enough to make a top 10?
The generation just gone had the best player of all-time at this, whose name I'll leave blank as it should be obvious who it is. It also had at least 5 more players of absolutely world class calibre who did the same for their respective teams.
So, who is out there that can do that in the here and now?
Kroos, Modric and Thiago are hard to argue against as the top 3, the order in which you put them is immaterial, I guess, but after them, does that type of player at that level of quality fall off a cliff? Who else is there? Are there even enough to make a top 10?