RIP DIEGO MARADONA

[Fulham Broadway 16,392]

^^^^ excellent post. Agree Ballack was underestimated, absolutely immense player.

Suppose the other thing is It is understandable that a players status is slightly more elevated when they die, like artists, musicians. Maradona was one of the greats, no doubt, of that era. 

With VAR now *spits*, a lot of his stuff would have been hauled back for a free kick. eg that wonder second goal against England probably would have been VAR ed back to the foul on Hoddle, as would the first obviously. Not bitter 

 

[NikkiCFC 7,580]

 

[OhForAGreavsie 5,775]

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

The comparison between Messi and Maradona regarding winning WC is unfair because many times you need luck to win WCs

Reaching two consecutive World Cup finals is not luck.

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

You say that Argentine had a bad squad.

I did not say that Argentina's world cup squad was bad in 1986. I said that it was not as good as their squad in 1978. Which it was not. I said that the 1990 squad was not good. Which it was not.

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

how bad must have been England back then when they could not even score a goal against a bad Argentina?

England did score against Argentina. They also very nearly equalised and definitely should have done.

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

You say that Messi had a better squad than Maradona. Even though England must have been far worse than Argentina back then because of the facts that I mentioned

You mentioned misapprehensions not facts. That's not a problem however, we all misremember things. My assertion is that Argentina's world cup winning squad of 1986 was good, but not great, and that the one which played West Germany in the final four years later was not even good. The quality of England is not relevant to that assertion. I am either right, or I am wrong. (I am not wrong. )

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

You say, you judge players based on their achievements

No, I said I'm measuring this comparison on their achievements. We all judge players on what we see but a debate based on you saying you prefer a while I prefer b is not going anywhere. If there is to be a discussion then an attempt has to be made to introduce something objective.

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

Ronaldo Nazario in my opinion is the best striker ever.

Brazilian Ronaldo would not make my all time top six strikers. For example, I place him a long way below Pele but I couldn't justify that opinion based on a comparison of the Brazil squads the two played in. That's because the three squads with which Pele won the World Cup were far superior to the ones in which Ronaldo played. All three of  Pele's groups would very likely have been world champions even without him so, in themselves, their victories tell us little about Pele. If I were searching for an objective argument with which to justify my opinion that Pele was the superior player I'd need something else. That's not the situation with my Maradona vs Messi comparison.

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

Michael Ballack never won anything big in his life. In my opinion, he is at least top three German midfielders of all time. I think Matthäus was better, but Ballack I think is the second place. Ballack lost 2 CL finals and he lost 1 WC final.

Where as those achievements tend to support my opinion that Michael was a good, not a great player. Any attempt at objective comparison has to be valid if it is to be meaningful. Sean Dyche never wins anything but measuring him on that basis would be meaningless. Arguing that he consistently outperforms his resources however probably tells you more about his quality as a manager. You need to choose a valid yardstick. I argue that the one I chose for Maradona vs Messi is valid.

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

Fucking Pogba won the world cup and he is nowhere near the level of Ballack

Well you and I agree about Pogba. When there was a fever here for bringing him to the club I repeatedly posted that I did not rate him and that I did not want him at any price, never mind £100m +

4 hours ago, killer1257 said:

Now, about the Pele vs Maradona debate. Maradona was much better. Maradona faced Maldini, Baresi and Nesta. Pele faced nobodys. Phil Jones would have been considered the goat defender back in Pele's time.

I'm sorry to say it but, in saying it, I ask you to believe that I am not one who looks for arguments or to be disrespectful to other TC members; this particular comment of yours is made in extreme ignorance.

[Vesper 27,310]

12 hours ago, cosmicway said:

The comparison between Pele and Maradona is based on who achieved most in his career.
This is not accurate because it depends on the teammates also.
Thus Pele won three world cups, but in the second he did not even play (in Chile 1962 he was injured in the second group stage match against Checoslovakia - it was Garincha, Vava and Amarildo who did the work after that). Maradona won one but if the Argentine squad of 1990 was a little better he could have won two.
Anyway Pele won three world cups and two intercontinental cups (with Santos 1962, 1963 - they defeated AC Milan and Benfica). The intercontinental final was a strong run affair those days - lost its significance in the mid seventies.
Diego won the Italian scudetto, UEFA cup (strong competition then - not like today's Europa) and the 1986 world cup. I don't care about the hand of God because fooling the referee is part of the day's work (and Tierry Henri also did it).
Pele never played for a European club. The South American teams were not giving their players so easily in the 60s. Inter Milan offered the record sum of 300,000 sterling - Santos were asking for 500,000 sterling.
Diego went to Barcelona first then to Napoli.
On paper Pele has more titles to his credit but Diego was better when seen as a unit after all. Difficult to distinguish.
 

Johann Cruyff is an also run and as for Messi he is Barca but his record in the national team is woeful.
 

 

well, we agree on the top 3

Maradona

Pele

Cruyff

we probably disagree (perhaps) over the rest of my top 10 (you also mentioned my 9th place, Garrincha)

my 11th (not counting the GKer I added, Lev Yashin, who is my 20th greatest player overall) would have been Zidane btw (I am sure most would put him top ten, I almost did, but Maldini pipped him based off sheer length of world class play at 2 positions, longest WC level run by far of any defensive player in history)

12th Eusébio

13th Gerd Müller

14th  Marco van Basten (would be top 10 if not for his horrible, career-ending injury)

15th Ronaldo (the striker)

16th Michel Platini

17th Zico

18th Franco Baresi

19th Giuseppe Meazza

20th  Lev Yashin

 

[Fulham Broadway 16,392]

Apparently died with less than 75k in his bank account

But has assets of 150m that hundreds of people including his alleged 11 children will battle out, along with various lawyers, corporates, and 'acquaitances' 

Death brings out the best and worst in people

[robsblubot 3,217]

Aside from being geniuses Pele and Maradona had one thing that made them legends: mentality. On the pitch both were sheer drive, determination, and passion... their teammates were made better by them, not the other way around. This is pretty obvious if you listen to any of Peles teammates, for example -- I've heard numerous reports on the subject.

One could say that Pele was even stronger there, a natural leader, but Diego edged him in close control of the football (and controlling the game although Pele did that too).

And that's one thing Messi lacks, even if not by much, in comparison with the above two. It's like in this generation we got Pele or Diego split into two different players: the crazy drive and determination went to CR7 while the creativity and ball control went to Messi.

That perhaps explains why Messi has been unable to reproduce his club-level form for Argentina. WC games are often more about passion and determination than organization or even pure technique. Yes, he hasn't been particularly lucky with this Argentine generation of footballers, but Maradona led similar (good) quality players to WC glory.

If Messi lacks a bit in the mentality aspect, Ronaldinho was a ZERO there. Perhaps there was more at play in Ronaldinho's case as the guy just does not seem "there" at times.

I've watched great footballers as I caught the fantastic Inter Milan derbies, but for me, as in how influential they were/are, would go like this:
1. Pele/Maradona
2. Messi (/ R9 for a brief period before knees went)

* garrincha was such an oddball that is difficult to place him. He was pure skill in dribbling, but a bit one-dimensional too. In terms of characteristics, think Robben at his very peak but stronger and more decisive.

CR7 would still be in the whereabouts, but of a more dependent player - as in he requires far more service than the ones listed above.

With the caveat I've not read/watched much about Cruyff, even if folks in Brazil have always said the guy was a genius on the pitch.

One important mention, player nobody here likely ever heard of: Dener 
He was incredible, but died in stupid car crash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dener

[OhForAGreavsie 5,775]

17 hours ago, cosmicway said:

Pele never played for a European club. The South American teams were not giving their players so easily in the 60s. Inter Milan offered the record sum of 300,000 sterling - Santos were asking for 500,000 sterling.

And this was pre-Bosman so if your club said you couldn't go, you couldn't go. End of story. They owned your contract until they agreed to release you. Even if you retired then came back you could not play for anyone else until a deal was done with your original club. The miracle is that this medieval system lasted as long as it did.

There were also other factors keeping him in Brazil though.

[MoroccanBlue 5,197]

Messi > anyone, personally. 
 

Mental the similarities between he and Maradona. 

 

[MoroccanBlue 5,197]

On 11/26/2020 at 2:27 PM, OhForAGreavsie said:

For many years consensus opinion held that either Maradona or Pele was the best footballer of all time. These days of course most fans give that honour to Messi but I'm still a holdout for Maradona being better than his fellow Argentine. I measure that on achievements.

The Argentina squad of 1986 was not a patch on their 1978 World Cup winning counterparts and the 1990 crew was nearer to being a bad side than it was to being a great one. Much nearer. Even so Maradona led the '86 group to world cup triumph then dragged the 1990 collection back to the final. This was possibly the greatest achievement of Maradona's career. Argentina 1990 really were not good. Messi has had a much better supporting cast during his international career than Maradona enjoyed but he's achieved nothing.

Then there's Napoli. During their long history Naples has won just two Serie A titles. Both came when the side was led by Diego Maradona. Take Messi out of the great Barcelona, replace him with Maradona, and they still win everything in sight. Reverse the process and swap Maradona out for Messi in those Napoli and Argentina teams of the 80s/90s and what would you get? We'll never know but I do know what I think.

Interesting post. Few things I take issue here. 

1.  The Argentina 1986 team was quite possibly the best footballing example of tactics formed by its composition. It honestly makes me cringe when I see comments of Maradona single handedly carrying that team. They were an efficient unit that knew their roles and supported Diego as the main creative outlook.  

2. You mentioned Messi had a better supporting cast compared to Maradona. This is a fallacy itself.  The issue with Argentina for the past decade were players and managers failing to cope with the immense pressure they had. When you have household names in Aguero, Higuain, Icardi,  Di Maria, Lavezzi, Papu Gomez, Pastore, Dybala, etc being absolutely shunned by Argentina fans for their inability to produce for the national team, you can see the issue lies far deeper than one man to fix. They are night and day incompatible compared to the 1985-1990 Argentina team. And yet, Messi is still the country's highest ever goal scorer. 

3. I have a big gripe when people base their opinions on hypothesis contrary to fact. Because it reeks of bias and it can't be realistically proven. You're also faulting a player based on circumstances. I could very much say the likelihood of Messi winning silverware with Napoli is higher than Maradona playing for Barcelona and replicating Messi's 60 goals a season for 10 years. Also, for all we know, the only difference between Maradona and Messi regarding WC glory could be as simple Burruchaga/Higuain. Reverse the two and who knows what would happen. Pretty sure had Burruchaga been through on goal against Neuer, he wouldn't of fluffed his chance like bottle job Higuain. Can it be proven? No. That's the issue with this fallacy. 

    

 

 

[Vesper 27,310]

43 minutes ago, MoroccanBlue said:

Interesting post. Few things I take issue here. 

1.  The Argentina 1986 team was quite possibly the best footballing example of tactics formed by its composition. It honestly makes me cringe when I see comments of Maradona single handedly carrying that team. They were an efficient unit that knew their roles and supported Diego as the main creative outlook.  

2. You mentioned Messi had a better supporting cast compared to Maradona. This is a fallacy itself.  The issue with Argentina for the past decade were players and managers failing to cope with the immense pressure they had. When you have household names in Aguero, Higuain, Icardi,  Di Maria, Lavezzi, Papu Gomez, Pastore, Dybala, etc being absolutely shunned by Argentina fans for their inability to produce for the national team, you can see the issue lies far deeper than one man to fix. They are night and day incompatible compared to the 1985-1990 Argentina team. And yet, Messi is still the country's highest ever goal scorer. 

3. I have a big gripe when people base their opinions on hypothesis contrary to fact. Because it reeks of bias and it can't be realistically proven. You're also faulting a player based on circumstances. I could very much say the likelihood of Messi winning silverware with Napoli is higher than Maradona playing for Barcelona and replicating Messi's 60 goals a season for 10 years. Also, for all we know, the only difference between Maradona and Messi regarding WC glory could be as simple Burruchaga/Higuain. Reverse the two and who knows what would happen. Pretty sure had Burruchaga been through on goal against Neuer, he wouldn't of fluffed his chance like bottle job Higuain. Can it be proven? No. That's the issue with this fallacy. 

    

 

 

Messi will NEVER have THIS

Maradona > Messi 

the only other player one can make a case for being the greatest footballer ever is Pele

all the rest are far behind

Messi will never get there

I will move him third if the Argies win the WC in 2022

I have him 5th behind Cruyff and Beckenbauer atm

each one of those four revolutionised the game during their careers

Messi has not, and he plays in a pinball league with shitty defences

the Brasil leagues of Pele days were MILES beyond what they are now in terms of talent

[Vesper 27,310]

Spine-tingling -Maradona's box lit up at night-time La Bombonera

 

 

[MoroccanBlue 5,197]

1 hour ago, Vesper said:

Messi will NEVER have THIS

Maradona > Messi 

He probably will.

Maradona is immortalized at the Bombonera. Just as Messi is at the Nou Camp. Fairly certain his farewell to Barcelona would produce a similar atmosphere considering the turn out Xavi got for his. Argentine passion for football is something else however. 

1 hour ago, Vesper said:

the only other player one can make a case for being the greatest footballer ever is Pele

all the rest are far behind

Messi will never get there

I will move him third if the Argies win the WC in 2022

 I prefer analyzing a player's overall ability and don't rely on team accomplishments as a barometer. Because it brings forth so many fallacies and inconsistencies. There are a select few players in history who's ability transcends goal scoring, so to say Messi is far behind and won't ever get there genuinely confuses me. 

1 hour ago, Vesper said:

I have him 5th behind Cruyff and Beckenbauer atm

each one of those four revolutionised the game during their careers

Messi has not, and he plays in a pinball league with shitty defences

the Brasil leagues of Pele days were MILES beyond what they are now in terms of talent

How has Messi not revolutionized the game? There's a bloody movie made by Jorge Valdano with your beloved Johan Cruyff saying Messi revolutionized the game. 

Just off the top of my head:

1. Messi revolutionized the 'false 9'. 

2. Messi was the key clog in Guardiola's system that revolutionized modern football with it's expansion on Michel/Cruyff's system. (Where Michel's was more about freedom, Guardiola's wanted an absolute respect of his tactic.) 

3. Messi beat Gerd Muller's record of goals in a calendar year. 91 goals. In a year...

4. Messi has averaged 55 goals a season for 10 years and has maintained this elite level of consistency for 10 years. 

5. Messi has won the most Ballon d'Ors' in history. 

This talk about not revolutionizing the game I will just laugh off personally.

I mentioned there are a select few players in history who's ability transcends goal scoring. Messi isn't just in contention for being one of the best goal scorers in history, he's in contention for being one of the best dribblers, one of the best passers, one of the best visionaries, one of the best free kick takers, and one of the best technical players. But yeah, he's far off according to you. 

The shitty defences argument always gets me. Other than Aguero and Vardy, Messi has more goals against the Premier League Top 6 than any player in the actual Premier League for the past 10 years. 

 

[11Drogba 2,000]

Serie A winners

1985 Hellas Verona 

1991 Sampdoria 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[cosmicway 1,252]

12 hours ago, OhForAGreavsie said:

And this was pre-Bosman so if your club said you couldn't go, you couldn't go. End of story. They owned your contract until they agreed to release you. Even if you retired then came back you could not play for anyone else until a deal was done with your original club. The miracle is that this medieval system lasted as long as it did.

There were also other factors keeping him in Brazil though.

I don't like the new system and it's not as if with the old system we, CFC, could not build a powerful team if we had the money.
 

[Blues Forever 1,232]

On 11/27/2020 at 6:22 PM, killer1257 said:

 

 

I am not hating on Maradona. I love him much more than Messi or CR7, but Maradona is not better than those two I mentioned.
The comparison between Messi and Maradona regarding winning WC is unfair because many times you need luck to win WCs. Maradona beat England with two goals that should not have counted. First it was the hand of god and then Sergio Batista fouled glenn hoodle (ball was somewhere else) and then 5 seconds Maradona scored his most famous goal ever. You say that Argentine had a bad squad. That may be true, but how bad must have been England back then when they could not even score a goal against a bad Argentina? They must have been horrible, especially judging how they defended against Maradona and the fact they could not score against a bad Argentinian side.

You say that Messi had a better squad than Maradona. Even though England must have been far worse than Argentina back then because of the facts that I mentioned, let's say your point is true. Let's talk about Messi in the WC final 2014. Argentina had horrible players like Romero, Rojo, Garay and Martin fucking Demichelis as their best defender and GK in their starting line. This is some garbage. I never understood how they even got into the final with that squad . Ohh wait, maybe it was Messi? Messi's second best player in the team was prime Di maria and he was injured in that final. In my opinion, Argentina would have even won with prime Di Maria but we will never know. So Argentina played very defensively because of the horrible players they have and they missed their second best player in offense. Germany on the other hand, had a squad full of world class or near world class players. Apart from Kramer, höwedes and Klose, their starting line up was near WC or WC. Those players I just mentioned are not even that bad. Klose was still good and probably had a better game than Higuain. So, Germany's starting line up was much superior than Argentina, especially in defense. I consider it a wonder that Argentina survived that long. I am pretty sure that Messi would have won the title with Germany too, if he was German lol.
So now you might say, why did Messi not win 2010? Even if Argentina somehow managed to win with a horrible defense against Germany, would Argentina have beaten spain? Spain from 2008 to 2012 might be the best national team of all time. Messi would have won the title with them too.

You say, you judge players based on their achievements. Ronaldo Nazario in my opinion is the best striker ever. Did he win the CL? No. Did he win WC? Yes.
Ronaldo Nazario won the WC 2002 because Oliver Kahn bottled a match like he never bottled a game before. After the first goal conceded, Germany was nervous and Ballack was not playing because he was suspended.
So without Kahn's mistake and Ballack suspended, who knows what could have happened. Funny thing is that Brazil 2002 had insane luck against Turkey in semi finals. Turkey received two red cards and Brazil received a penalty. Rivaldo dived and someone got sent off and the one penalty was not a penalty because it was outside of the penalty box. Even if it was a foul, it was not in the penalty box. So basically Ronaldo had a lot of luck during WC and Messi did not. If Neuer was bottling like Oliver Kahn, Messi would have won the WC 2014 too lol.

Coming back to judging players based on achievements. Michael Ballack never won anything big in his life. In my opinion, he is at least top three German midfielders of all time. I think Matthäus was better, but Ballack I think is the second place. Ballack lost 2 CL finals and he lost 1 WC final.
2002 WC final he missed because he was suspended. He lost with Leverkusen against Real Madrid, in which Zidane scored a world class goal. Nothing wrong with losing to Madrid, who had a better squad. He lost against Manchester United in the CL final because John Terry was not good enough to score a penalty. Was it his fault that he never won a big trophy? Not in my opinion. Can he be considered maybe as the greatest German midfield player ever? In my opinion yes, even though I think it is someone else. Fucking Pogba won the world cup and he is nowhere near the level of Ballack. Prime Ballack would have won the with France 2018 or with Germany 2014. But he never had the luck just like Messi never had luck.
Coming back again to your point about judging players based on achievements.
In my opinion, Suarez is Ronaldo Nazario level. Maybe a little better, maybe a little worse. I think Suarez is a little bit worse than Ronaldo, but ok. Suarez played the best PL season a PL striker ever played. In 33 matches, he scored 31 goals and had 17 assists. He had Messi level stats in PL. Did he win the PL? No. Is there a case that he had the best PL striker season of all time? Yes. Is he maybe the best PL striker PL has ever seen? Judging based on his short time he was in PL, there will probably never be another Suarez. Did Suarez win the WC like Ronaldo did? No. He still is close to Ronaldo Nazario in my opinion. You will not win the WC with Uruguays squad.

By the way, you say that replacing Messi in a Barcelona team with Maradona would not change anything? Messi scored more than 50 goals for Barcelona in 2010. Maradona in his whole Napoli career scored 80 goals,while Maradona scored 20 goals with Barcelona and won only one cup. You do realise that Messi and Ronaldo are much better goal scorer than Maradona, regardless if he played in Serie A against Maldini, Baresi and Nesta. When Messi took the next step, he was the reason why Barcelona ended Real Madrids La Liga title run. Maradona was the best of his era, but Messi and CR7 are better than him. People forget how many goals and assist players like Messi and Ronaldo do and how much quality their goals are. I just watched Maradonas goaly for Napoli and they are all good, but Messi and Ronaldo have scored much better goals to be honest. And I love Maradona million times more than both messi and cr7. Maradona had his charisma that was something else.

Now, about the Pele vs Maradona debate. Maradona was much better. Maradona faced Maldini, Baresi and Nesta. Pele faced nobodys. Phil Jones would have been considered the goat defender back in Pele's time.






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Pele also faced against the best CBs of all time in Moore, Beckenbauer, and Figueroa. Phil Jones would still remained as a nobody in Pele's time.

[killer1257 3,282]

Pele also faced against the best CBs of all time in Moore, Beckenbauer, and Figueroa. Phil Jones would still remained as a nobody in Pele's time.

Did he face them in the Brazilian league also?



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[Blues Forever 1,232]

Just now, killer1257 said:

Did he face them in the Brazilian league also?



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No, but he faced them in WC, Friendlies, and Copa Libertadores.

[Vesper 27,310]

On 28/11/2020 at 2:43 PM, Blues Forever said:

Pele also faced against the best CBs of all time in Moore, Beckenbauer, and Figueroa. Phil Jones would still remained as a nobody in Pele's time.

Elias Figueroa was a fucking beast

make him 27 now and he would TOWER above all other CB's, huge gap, (yes including VVD)