Ballon d'Or 2012 Thread...

At least we're agreed on something ... even I'd say Maradona was the best in ball control ever

 

Are trying to say that Messi is rarely closed down by multiple opponents?

 

however i still think messi is better

 

Yes ... I guess Gullit was like me ... older and wiser ..

by late 70's I thought Cruijff was the best all time (My first Idol in growing up) and ...
until Maradona of mid 80's I changed my mind ... Maradona was the best ..
but until he retired, there was a great debate between Pele and Maradona from mid 90's to early 2000's... and so I satrted digging deeper in Pele (seriously) .. and since then I made up my mind Pele was truely the best there ever been..

I used to be amazed with Best's pana, Maradona 360, Ronaldo steps over, elasticos ... Pele has done all -
What made Pele was more unique was he was great in shooting , and "reverse spin" pass... (most Zico, Maradona Zidane did great thru passes with inch perfect, yesss, but Pele did that with a reverse spin so that the ball was fast forward and slowing down to near stop right at his teammate's feet... Many younger fans would be thrilled with Ronaldinho's flipping ball over defenders into the area during his best (04-07) well Pele was master ofthat too ...

 

"Messi is Maradona meets Gerd Müller"

201 goals + 90 assists in the last 200 games for Barcelona.

 

I'm still in doubt about such a definitive conclusion... I do think however that Maradona, Pelé, Cruijff and Platini showed closer control in their early career. I watched a fair chunk of material and I saw that Platini and Cruijff had actually a closer dribbling style before their 'glory' years. It is the same with Pelé... after 1963 or so his strides became less frequent and 'larger' in nature. A young Pelé had very close control with quick footwork.

This is a good channel with a few young Maradona highlights
http://www.youtube.com/user/warlock7885



IMO, the ball control in his early years is a lot more impressive and consistent as later in his career at Napoli.

For Platini unfortunately not much is available on internet but baboarum said that he was in his pre-Italy years famed for his short bursts and dribbling. Some Nancy material exists though.


For Cruijff I can point at both Liverpool games that are avalaible (1966), or these two brief highlights where his different dribbling style (compared with 1972-1974 prime years) is noticeable.





I think even in those brief excerpts it is noticeable that he used shorter and above all more frequent strides as well as closer control - in terms of how his legs remain close to the ball.


This is of course not surprising to me - football was very grueling in these days and before Platini and Cruijff reached the peak of their fame they had met a handful of serious injuries (knee, ankle, groin, thigh etcetera). And even Messi has now a different dribbling style as before 2009.

What do you think?

 

id disagree. i think maradonas control and body type he was stockier at napoli made his control better. In his boca days he seemed a bit more languid which hindered his control, his best control came later:


minute 3:47 in this video illustrates the perfect type on control im speaking of, controlling it with the chest, turn of the dime with the outside, then shooting with the outside of his foot to the opposite corner. perfect control



minute 1:45 in this video (1986) the whole video actually. he keeps the ball closer and skips past defenders because of his closer control

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXwbMM6bOOE

minute 2:43 in this one (1987)

 

I still think messi dribbles different than maradona, messi runs like a running back runs in american football, short bursts of speed and the main difference is that he runs and changes directions as if the ball isnt there. the best demonstration of this would be the 2nd goal against real madrid in the champions league semi final 2011. im sure weve all seen it a billion times so i wont bug you by posting it.

 

Well not really, maybe relatively to Pele's own standard then yes, but if compared to other players, Pele 64-70 was still among the best *if not the best (minus his 66 injuries at WC year, and injuries in 68 ...(note that 1965 was another best year of Pele with >111gaols/75games).
The TRUTH was that Pele after 1961 * his very best season, he became the "most fouled" players .. (well may be until Maradona in mid80;s) so thatmade him become more "cautious" in dribble run ... that's ALL!!!

Hereis a brief clips of Pele with the opening (first 10seconds) when he dribbled passed a few Germany players INCLUDING Beckenbauer (left on ground) and scored. That was the forendly game with Germany in 69 (just before WC70) - just to see he was "great in dribbles and strides even at 28/29 yrs old.

In this game he dribbled passed 3players and got knocked on gorund , scored 1 PK, and the 2nd goal wchih seen iat 10s in this clip as another dribble run and scored). Brazil tied 2-2 with Pele's 2goals

 

Good post that makes sense and yes, his control at mid-career was also very good but still I think it was early in his career even more impressive, before he broke his ankle and the addictions. With control I also mean the trapping - he showed some really impressive things when he was young. Maybe also because the Argentinian league allowed him to do that while in Italy less room existed to play as a trickster but still...

 

Between the nostalgia some ontopic.

Guti - "It's a real shame he's a Barça player, but I'll never get tired of saying I'd give the Ballon d'Or to Messi."

 

Why are you so certain that Pelé and Maradona were more fouled as others?

Yes, he was certainly great after 1963 but I mentioned that his dribble style changed, which is logical.

Anyhow, what kind of issues had Pelé in 1968 according to you? Which heavy injuries?

Btw, that Germany game was in 1968 and not 1969.

 

id also like to point out that Pele did not score at the end of that run that James BH11 cited, not that it makes that big of a difference.

Anyways id also like to point out that Pele and Messi also have/had better rhythm when dribbling in comparison to maradona

 

To illustrate the point I made:

http://www.fcbarcelona.com/football...grant-wahl-barca-is-part-of-us-sports-culture

 

Just to put this in perspective though, the average American has never heard of Messi or Barcelona, and the average sports fan has never seen either play, and only cares about American football. With basketball and baseball next in their order of caring.

It's all the immigrants in the US, mainly, that your links are referring to.

 

müller has scored in this 5 games 12 of his teams 16 goals...75%.....and the assisters of the other 4 goals are unknown..its possible müller had assists too...
its a farce you praise messi scoring 45% of his team goals and olso pointing out barca without messi keygoals fell from 2 in position 6 in la liga...
without müllers 12 goals how many games bayern wins??...

you total ignore this points here but use it if it favors messi in other debattes....

bayern munich has played in 36 days 20 games and 5 of this 20 games was ligacup games..müller missed one due a injury happend in a friendly game...
1.--- 31 july ...wacker burghausen-bayern
2. ---3 august....1860 munich-bayern ..ligacup
3.----5. august ...bayern-ajax amsterdam
4.---7. august...wacker münchen-bayern
5.---9 august....ajax amsterdam-bayern
6.---10 august ...feyernood rotterdam-bayern
7.---12 august....fc valencia-bayern
8.----13 august ...stuttgart-bayern...ligacup
9.---15 august ....brügge-bayern
10.---16 august ....bayern hof-bayern ....ligacup
11.---17 august... german olympia team-bayern
12.---20 august...ac beerschott-bayern
13.---23 august...bayern-1866 munich ... ligacup
14.---26 august...athletico bilbao-bayern
15.---27 august....fr botafogo-bayern
16.----29 august...standert liege-bayern
17.---30 august...deportivo las palmas-bayern
18.---3 september...bayern-bayern hof..ligacup
19.---5 september....voest linz-bayern
20.----6 september grazer ak-bayern

playing away in spain,holland,belgium and austria..lot of travelling..

yeah if a player plays a lot of games he loose a lot energy..and müller has played several games affected with a not healed out particulare broken calfbone in the midseason, inclusive both europeanchampioncups games against ajax amsterdam in this season???no???

and the oldtimers plays down messi....lol..

 

müller has played 11 seasons in european cups....

6 seasons in eurochampionscup....4 times topscorer(1973,1974,1975,1977),1 times runner up with (1976)only 1 goal behind heynckes 1975/76..one goal him was wrongfully recalled against st.eitienne (final 1975/76)...
3 seasons in euro cupwinners cup....3 times runner up in the topscorer rankings---bayern winner 1967....bayern reached semifinal 1968 and reached semifinal 1972
1 times fairs cup.....1 times runner up in the topscorer ranking...bayern reached semifinal 1971...


9 times in top 2....

bundesliga season 1976 and season 1977..bayern combinated has scored 146 goals in 68 games....müller due injurys has not played 21 of this 64 games(about 33%)....bayern with müller in team has scored in 43 games 122 goals and without him in 21 games 25 goals....
i like to see barca playing without messi in 21 games and barca scoring only 25 goals...

seriously the gpg rate debatte confirm not eveything..........the whole offensive of bayern munich without him is collapsed more or lesser in a unreal scenario...

 

Messi just broke 300 goals barrier in top flight national level football. Who was the last one doing so as 25 years old?

 

It's a most common sense as no stats had ever made out ... until Castrol did for WC 70-10 - Here Maradona was the most fouled player in WC history (well from 70 up) with 53fouls/7games at 86= 7,8 fouls per game. This is not new. Everyone watched Maradona and Pele would have noticed they got at least 5fouls (up to 15) per game ... Hence in average of 1000games of Pele (minus 300+ unimportant ones) Pele would have made the most fouls in number (thousands) if one dare to count.

Here is one small clips to illustrate 1001 ways to stop Pele with fouls, pulling shirt, bad tackles, hooking and .... crying

 

he said top flight

 

Just wondering, who exactly kept count of Pele's' goals? I mean the ones he didn't score. Is there list of the 1283 goals he scored? I know there are bunch that are official, but I want to take a look at the unofficial, any of you guys have the list of that?

 

That was from a reporter (journalists) who happened to be Pelemania ...and he did follow pelein everygame to count - here you go
http://pele.m-qp-m.us/english/pele_statistics.shtml
============================================
Just before turning 26, (like messi now)
Pele scored 59goals/61games for Brazil (almost double number of messi 31go/75ga but in less games)
Pele scored ~800goals/660+games in all games (clubs, NT and friendlies)

 

National level, not regional.