Yeah, true - it was generally Corso as left midfielder (not staying to the wing) and Jair as right side attacker wasn't it (in previous years), although not necessarily staying upfield with the striker all the time. So Domenghini would be Jair's direct replacement pretty much I think.
Puskas had truly very limited international exposure until 1952, as far as playing against good teams is concerned (this has been shown/discussed before). But there it is just assumed by default the Hungarian league was great as early as 1946. Not that I'm necessarily against it, but it's just a 'fact' Puskas until 1952 only played one really elite team.
This is true. Part of it though is potentially based on a continuation of the idea that Hungary had been strong in the 1930s and the general strength of the Danubian school in that era. In contrast the Dutch had been one of the leading continental teams in the 10s and maybe 20s, but then had a period in the doldrums before a resurgence in the 70s. At least that is the perception. Maybe part of it is also the fact that there was no good test for clubs in that era. Makes it hard to judge what were the strongest leagues then.
Excuse Tom. Finally will be a list of honorable mentions for this season? It would be very interesting to be able to make a complete comparison with the list you did at the time.
My feeling is that in the post war years, hungarian league is potentially a top-5, not least than top-10 league. In this exercise, we've see that a league from that caliber, can run 3-5 players able to make a 23 best players list, including HM. I think, Puskas was one of those 3-5 best players in Hungary at that time
Ultimately this is a 'feeling' based on little to nothing. Hungary wasn't there at the 1950 World Cup either, nor at the 1948 Olympics, though despite not playing elite sides (except Italy) they did have a top 10 Elo ranking throughout. As Ariaga II says, the fact Garrincha and Didi won the World Cup six years earlier bears no relevance to what local heroes do in the confinements of their league. It's not a time where 90%+ of the world's best players play in a handful leagues. Meanwhile, the fact some of those tends to do quite well against the best teams of his own league plus those outside it, given the chance, cannot be ignored - and given contemporary evidence on team rankings etc. it is also not revisionism.
The real Ballon d'Or timing doesn't make any sense either. France Football deciding to make the vote calendar year based and not correcting their mistake for nearly 70 years doesn't mean we have to repeat it. In my opinion the negatives of cutting competitions in half, having variing numbers of competitions (some Brazilian years have 2 paulistas, others 0) each year, having to look up dates to find out which competition belogs to which year instead of just looking at the number (this is minor is a minor point, but might cause confusing to outsiders looking at the list), are worse than having a slight delay between the European and South American/Hungarian/Soviet timeframe. It something that could have been done in reality by magazines at the time. Vote is done is December 1967: Consider 1966/67 for Europe and 1967 for SA/etc. I know it was already discussed, changed once, so let's leave it at that.
This is not just directed at you. More people than just you have mentioned the idea that Hungary only played one top team before 1952. Who was that top team? Italy? On what basis were Italy a top team but not Austria? Who were the top teams at the time and what national team besides Hungary were playing top national teams consistently? This looks like a strong schedule to me. In 47 Hungary played Austria x2 Italy Yugoslavia In 48 Austria x2 Czechs Swiss In 49 Austria x2 Sweden x2 Italy Czechs In 50 Austria x2 Czechs In 51, light schedule for sure Czechs
It is in the discussion thread. https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/bi...iscussion-thread.2097013/page-2#post-37648252
It seems in more recent Elo revisions Austria has received a bump and is now around place 11-13 (they are just inside top 10 in 1945, but that's very, very tricky given worldwide context). That's a difference with earlier research by me. After 1945 there are two occasions where Austria is ranked (just) top 10, last time in 1948, but Hungary lost both matches and Puskas didn't score in them (edit: didn't seem to have played well either, in one of them even outright poor). Italy was (more of) a top team because they're ranked number one and number four in the Elo when Hungary played them. I have these down as top teams until 1952, played against by Puskas: 1947 Italy 2-3 loss (penalty); 1949 Italy 1-1 at home, 1949 Sweden 5-0 win (1 goal), 1949 Sweden 2-2 draw away. Where it has to be remarked Sweden played with their 'real' amateurs in the 5-0 loss. They played with their best team available in the 2-2. Switzerland was around 16-18 so I wouldn't count them as 'elite'. Czechoslovakia was between 15 and 23 all the time, so not elite either. Yugoslavia ranked 22-25. Of course, Hungary was a fantastic team and was also pretty fine against Austria without Puskas. edit: this has to be seen in combination with the club game - Honved started to play Milan, Wolves, Austria Wien etc. in friendlies no earlier than 1952/1953.
W.Germany and Wales were top-10 according ELO in that period. Do you rate them that way? Which 10 teams/leagues were better than hungarian? Until 1952, Puskas has more goals than ganes at NT and was 3 times league goalscorer.
Come on Puck, it's logical what I usually ask you and less emotional explosions. @Tom Stevens, I apologize for the delay in voting the top 23, but it's certainly difficult for me about some cases with the question of periods and the results seem me good. Maybe I didn't have Simpson or Viktor (no goalkeeper). I'm not so sure as Rocha as 3rd in my vote (maybe Charlton deserved it more).
Yes, that's correct. As far as I know about Carlos Alberto in those years (1966, 1967, 1968...) he was a highly offensive side player with a special touch to be a side playmaker and prone to the goal. He dabbled as a regular centre-back in his late career. Do you know exactly when?
Really really late in his career (*77 - Flamengo. -- For Fluminense in 76 he was a RB still, with Edinho and Miguel as main CBs.). He even played some games for the national team as a CB (78'WC Qualifiers). BRASIL 6x0 COLÔMBIA (Brazil 6x0 Colombia) 2 - Zé Maria I [Corinthians] - RB 3 - Luiz Pereira [Atlético de Madrid] - CB 4 - Carlos Alberto Torres [Flamengo] - CB 6 - Marinho Chagas [Fluminense] - LB BRASIL 1x0 PARAGUAI (Brazil 1x0 Paraguay) 2 - Zé Maria I [Corinthians] - RB 3 - Luiz Pereira [Atlético de Madrid] - CB 4 - Carlos Alberto Torres [Flamengo] - CB 6 - Marinho Chagas [Fluminense] - LB BRASIL 1x1 PARAGUAI (Brazil 1x1 Paraguay) 6 - Marinho Chagas [Fluminense] - LB 4 - Carlos Alberto Torres [Flamengo] - CB 3 - Edinho [Fluminense] - CB 2 - Marco Antônio [Vasco] - RB Both Marco Antônio and Marinho Chagas were left-backs. But if they purposely gave Marco Antônio the number 2, the chances that he was the one improvised as RB are way way higher.
Correction: Already in 72, while playing for Santos FC, C.A.T. started to play more frequently as a CB (Regular starter RB - 72' Orlando Lelé; 73' Hermes). For Fluminense, from 74 to 77, he played as CB [Toninho Baiano as RB or Rubens Galaxe (also could play as LB, CB and DM], DM and RB (like in 76's Carioca Championship - Miguel and Edinho as CBs).
Looking at him again - and knowing some usual suspects are tempted to include Suarez - no we can not easily assume this. Ajax wasn't regarded as a top team (top 5, top 10) in Europe, unlike 1967, and they became four times consecutive champion after Suarez while during Suarez his time they experienced an eight years drought. Domestically Suarez did well against an off-the-pace PSV and Feyenoord (although in some matches his actions decorated the matches rather than deciding them) but really did not make an impact, and didn't score, against champions Twente. For the national team, in this Eredivisie period, his goals and performances certainly did not come against top 10 teams (which Hungary was in 1966). In Europe it is the same story. The best he could score against was Marseille and Auxerre; while Real Madrid, Juventus, Milan, Fiorentina, HSV was too much at the time. It's not like scoring (from open play) against Real Madrid or Liverpool, and turning up in almost all games when you have to play a strong team (meaning: a high percentage and number of games). This also holds for both players if you include the club friendlies (for an extra reference). Consequently, although transfer fees aren't only decided by player quality, Suarez was not a player to get transferred for a record fee while the excellent Marshall Cavendish encyclopedia of 1970 estimated JC14 his market value to be well over a million (thus more than twice the current world record - this would have been materialized if he had gone to Madrid rather than Barca). We can also turn the question around: is there reason to assume Suarez was better around 2014-2015 as around 2010? Plenty. Is there reason to assume JC14 was as an individual much better in 1971 as a few years before? Far less.
WS [Feb 69] had some interesting stuff on this subject. It looks like Gerd Muller was a bit of a cocky douche around this time. He was publicly criticizing Schön and team tactics (so basically being an average German footballer). He also refused to play alongside Uwe Seeler. Around this time Seeler ended his international career, so it looks to me like Muller kinda squeezed him out? Of course later on Seeler returns to the NT, and completely changes his playing style to accommodate him and Muller in the same team. Heckuva achievement and great team spirit from Seeler. As a disclaimer this info came from the camp of Germany's qualifier opponents. But if true, I would have had my reservations about this guy, too. It does also show how highly Muller was already valued if the selectors dropped their top guy of the last ten years out of his way.
Maybe, the official story was Seeler retired May 1968 (but was soon convinced to come back) because he hadn't the fitness any more and needed too much time to recover, and regularly need half a week to come back to powers. https://resolver.kb.nl/resolve?urn=ddd:011196722:mpeg21:a1017 It has to be said that during/after this decision the appearances for his club indeed increased again.