Xavi/Iniesta better than Zidane?

zizou is a top 20 all timer not because of his ability to entertain(you almost made him sound like a circus clown comparable to denilson and robinho)
zidanes individual achievements exceed 95% of players who have ever played the game
dont forget he was voted serie a player foreign player of the season multiple times while in juventus ,a top 3 undisputed best player in 2 world cups and the best player in euro 2000 ( a top 4 all time european championship performance ever imo)
same rank as platini 84
mvb 88
dragan dzajic 68

zidanes club career was remarkable when compared to ever single player except the following:
(in no particular order)
pele
maradona
zico
messi
cristiano ronaldo
michel platini
eusebio
puskas
ruud gullit
marco van basten
puskas
johan cruyff
alfredo di stefano
ronaldo de lima
gerd muller
franz becenbaur

others like george best,garrincha,laszlo kubala,rivaldo,ronaldiniho etc reached a higher performance level but couldnt keep it up for 1 reason or another

 

Hahaha. Funny meme, but again, you are wrong I'm happy to know for a fact. "But all that's missing the point. You can deny it all you want, but it is obvious that Xavi got to play in his preferred role for his club team for all of his peak years. Zidane didn't for the majority of his peak years. It is as simple as that." You are wrong Estel. The demonstrable fact is that Xavi most definitely did not played all of his peak years in his ideal role, in fact, it isn't even difficult to argue that Xavi played only 2 seasons in his ideal role, in his peak years. That would be: season 2008-09 and season 2009-10. Xavi Hernandez already looked an old player at World Cup 2010, when he was just 30 years old. And at most, you could add season 2010-11 as a 'peak season' for Xavi (which truly isn't the case, mind you), and that still is just 3 seasons out of an entire career. In conclusion: the fact is that most of Xavi's better years were wasted on a very conservative role, and Xavi went back to that 'very conservative' role in season 2011-12, which arguably started in season 2010-11 if one analyzes Xavi's role closely.

Zinedine Zidane played his ideal role in 1999-00, 2000-01, 2001-02, 2002-03, and 2003-04, at the very least. That's at least 5 seasons -- that's definitely more than Xavi had in his peak years, in fact, that's almost twice as many years as Xavi had in peak years. Not to mention that Zidane aged better as an athlete. Zidane in 2002-03 still looked relatively young at 30 years of age, compared to Xavi who did in fact looked old-and-slow already at 30 years of age. The fact of the matter is that Zidane's style of play never worked anywhere near as efficiently at club level - because at club level, you rarely ever see Ronaldinho's ability nullified by fat R9's inability to look for a pass (bu working hard for that pass). This simplistic belief that Zidane would've been much more successful had he played the same role at club level -- it insults the intelligence of every single coach Zidane ever had at Juventus and then at Real Madrid. If results were that simple to come by, you can rest assured that Zidane would have played his 'ideal role' for a lot longer than 5 seasons. Of course, reality is rarely ever simple, and sure as hell nowhere near as your conveniently simplistic excuse for Zidane. You really do not appear to understand what Zidane actually added to his teams.

 

I think you are forgetting the whole greater parity in that era point, when you say you wouldn't agree to Zidane being more dominant.

Also, Zidane was just one player. Hardly fair to compare the dominance that he could have achieved alone, to that achieved by Xavi and Iniesta together while playing behind Messi in an era with less parity.

I made that statement since I personally thought Zidane was pretty great during the initial part of the 03/04 campaign. This assertion is based on some empirical evidence as well, since he made 4 ESM monthly XI teams in the 7 months from September 2003 to March 2004. In comparison during the 02/03 season, across the same period i.e. September to March, he made 2 ESM monthly XI teams.

Also, now you're underselling the galacticos, since if they were not that great during Zidane's time with Real Madrid, it would mean that him winning the 01/02 CL and 02/03 La Liga with them was more exemplary than one would consider otherwise. I doubt you'd agree to that line of thinking though.

The truth is that Raul was pretty good till he got injured in the 2002/03 season. Same for Ronaldo till he got injured in 2003/04. Regarding Beckham I agree, but the interesting part is that due to his media pull and trademark skill, he actually got first dibs on all freekicks. So even though he was not overshadowing the galacticos, he was getting to take almost all the freekicks, which would help enhance his goal and assist stats and negatively impact those of others. Figo, you already considered as being a galactico level player.

For the nth time, Ronaldo was just an example of Juventus not making the big moves in the transfer market. While I was proposing Zidane's ascendency based on the hypothetical scenario wherein Juventus retained players who actually did play with him and with whom he worked well together, but who in reality ended up being sold for profit.

Ok, seems you didn't understand what I was hinting at.

I was saying that Zidane hit his peak earlier than regular midfielders (i.e. at 25 with a Balon d'Or 3rd place in 97) and stayed in it for longer as well (i.e. for minimum 7 years considering his Balon d'Or 5th place in 03). Remember, those Balon d'Or positions were achieved in non NT tournament years, and without playing as the focus of his club teams.

Xavi doesn't have a similarly strong case to make one think that his peak was any longer than that of the average midfielder i.e. from ages 28-32.

Still don't see you talking about Zidane elevating his teams. But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that its what you were meaning to talk about above.

You could have saved both of us a lot of words though, by admitting this when I first replied to you.

You don't get it at all. Cruyff and Eusebio didn't play for Brazil, unlike Zico. The expectations were completely different for them with regards to World Cup success.

As for Pele playing for the best Brazilian team, well a lot of Brazilian old timers would tell you that the World Cup 82 Brazilian team was very very special too. Obviously because it failed to win, it wouldn't be classified as the best, but that doesn't mean it would be classified as categorically weaker than Pele's Brazilian teams either.

As for Zico's move to Europe, it happened when he was 30, and he went to Udinese. He still almost won the Capocannoniere against Platini in his first season. Injuries hampered him in his second though. And yeah, you really sound naive when you try to make a point by talking about where Zico played during a large part of the 80s, since his peak years were at the turn of the decade i.e. 79-82 while his strong years were from 74-84. The truth is, he hardly played at all during his time in Brazil from 85-89.

Nope, I am assuming that if Maradona (86), Eusebio (66), Garrincha (62), Jairzinho (70), Cruyff (74), etc. had been unable to feature in the World Cup tournaments which occurred during their respective peaks, then they wouldn't be considered NT greats and all timers of nearly the same magnitude. Zidane on the other hand is considered one in spite of being unable to make an impact on the World Cup tournament, that occurred during his peak.

When you need to bring in Pele and his World Cup career in order to try and make your point vs Zidane, that says it all IMO, regardless of how you consider Zidane's World Cup tournament performances.

For the record, I don't find it hard to believe that Pele could have gone on to have a better World Cup than either his 58 or 70 WCs, if he had not gotten injured in 62, considering that he was tearing it up for Santos during that period. Just like I don' t find it difficult to believe that Zidane could have had a stellar World Cup in 2002, considering that he got two goals and an assist in the semifinals and final of the Champions League, during the month preceding that WC tournament.

 

The majority of people, on average (but especially sports fans), tend to vote with their hearts, not with their minds. That's the short answer to Zidane's charisma. Of course, the fact that Zidane played in the very first era of 'high quality replays' did in fact greatly magnified the 'heart' behind that myth. The heart votes on the basis of perception, and perception was relatively poor pre-1996.

On one hand, Zidane played for France, which at the time was not perceived as one of the top national teams in the world. On the other hand, the World Cup 1998 was going to be played in France, at the same time that Zidane was 25 years old, and at the same time as France became one of the more talented national teams in the world. As soon as Zidane won the hearts and minds of the world, specifically after his performance at the World Cup Final 1998; Zidane in effect became the face of the very first 'style above substance' era of football. And not only was Zidane an ideal player to represent the very first era of style-magnified-by-replays, but Zidane was arguably the perfect player for that time and place. It was the 'style above substance' era that came before the 'super teams' era. The 'style above substance' era where players like Zidane systematically enjoyed the creative freedoms that they wouldn't at all enjoy in a modern super team. And so Zidane wasn't as efficient as he could possibly be, and perhaps he also wasn't as good a player as he could've possibly been -- but Zidane was arguably as impressive a player as he could've possibly been (in any era). The perception of being 'impressive' is arguably and significantly more powerful than any statistical paper work could ever hope to be, in the collective mind of 'the fans'. Zidane, be that by coincidence or by design, became the perfect anthem for his generation. In contrast, the young R9 was 'the chosen one' who never really performed to the expectations, but who nonetheless did enough to be regarded as a consensus Top 10-20 all timer in his own right.

To summarize how much the overall perception-per-player had improved in Zidane's time; it's similar to watching Michael Laudrup, but watching Laudrup in high quality 17-24 times per league season, instead of just the 4-8 times (in high quality) per league season. So you get more than triple the amount of quality video, which in turn creates the illusion/perception that that specific player must be a very special player. In truth, there's very little to suggest that Zidane was in any way an improvement over Hagi or Laudrup. And yes, the pre-Zidane experts still made respectable assumptions and/or measurements about the great players of the 'before replays' era, but educated analysis is no match against self-evident, self-fulfilling, self-sufficient, camera-based perception. Overall, I think that Pele, Messi, Maradona, Zidane, Cristiano Ronaldo, are all overrated to varying degrees. That being said, Zidane is arguably unique (in how he is overrated) in several ways:

1. Zidane at club level was arguably not better than R9, Luis Figo, Francesco Totti, Alessandro Del Piero, Pavel Nedved, etc. And not because those other players were really great, but because Zidane himself was clearly nothing special at club level. For reference: Luka Modric would easily compete against Zidane, at club level. So unlike Cristiano Ronaldo and/or Messi, Zinedine Zidane did not dominated club football for any extended period of time, as a matter of fact, Zidane arguably never even dominated club football not even for one single season.

2. Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are not really players who benefited from superior camera work. Yes, the television definition is much better today than back in 2001, but the camera work itself is not better in any demonstrable manner. In fact, I prefer the camera style of Zidane's era, over the camera style of Messi's era. Bottom line: Zidane started playing the game exactly at the same time as the sport became a much more polished television product. Zidane and R9 did demonstrably benefited from the fact that they played the sport when the sport was going through an unprecedented revolution. Zidane was the perfect player for his time, in much the same way that Cristiano Ronaldo is the perfect player for the 'social media' era. The crucial difference here is, in my opinion: Zidane's era worked in accordance to proven 'pleasure points' in the human mind... Cristiano Ronaldo's era does not work in accordance to proven psychology - it's essentially social media propaganda backed by nothing but stats and paper work and more stats. Only the good designs stand the test of time. Zidane's era was a good design backed by a real currency. Ronaldo's era was not a good design, and was not backed by any real currency. Put differently: Zidane's era with all its flaws, has aged gracefully overall... In contrast, Ronaldo's era will probably be remembered as Messi's era, but what defined the era itself (the social media) will probably age badly, because it truly is a horribly superficial design that will definitely not stand the test of time.

The social media era is essentially a dumber era, a more irrational era, where blatant ignorance is celebrated as if it were some merit that ought to be worn with pride. The intelligent part of the 'social media era' can be found on the internet, because the internet is not dominated by the 'politically correct' insanity that has ruined television journalism. But for the most part: social media fans care more about the social media perception of the player, than about the actual performance level of the player... Which is why 'the social media era' will probably age badly, because there's no way that such glaring flaws will not get 'dealt with' sooner rather than later. Fans want to be entertained, and pseudo-statistics are not entertaining, and will probably go away as soon as the 'novelty' appeal of the social media runs out.

3. Zidane was good in 2 Finals, but those 2 Finals were against weakened teams or against demonstrably inferior teams. Bayer Leverkusen 2001-02 was the team that played the Final vs. Real Madrid, but Bayer Leverkusen 2001-02 was also the team that was destroyed 4-0 by Juventus. Bayer Leverkusen 2001-02 was a clear 'underdog', and was expected to lose, and did lose. Zidane scored a spectacular goal for the ages, but the dull reality is that Real Madrid probably would have won that game even if you took out both Zidane and Figo (or just one of those two).

I'll have to watch those videos before making any elaborate commentary, but in general, I can make the educated assumption that I will probably agree with the essence of the argument - manufactured consent (i.e., political correctness) is very much a demonstrable fact. I for one, have the ability of putting that thought aside for some of the time, so as to thoroughly enjoy when the World Cup, or the Euro, or the Champions League, comes along. But what I genuinely cannot do, is to continue to fool myself after those tournaments become history.

 

what i`ll do is just answer questions that to me make more sense in order to steer the conversation to the original argument. i have to get to some other questions later because of a lack of time

playing with Messi has a great potential to undermine your value compared to playing with other teams. Rakitic is a good example of an attacking mid who was given much more freedom and therefore able to be much more of an influence for Sevilla. having to play on a team that centers around a player as great as messi can potentially greatly reduce your role. something that could just as easily have happened to Zidane.
I don`t disagree that zidane could have looked better if he had another midfielder or forward of extremely high caliber on his team (as you say) but the opposite effect could happen as well.
this debate we are having could go on forever because ultimately neither of us can prove this point because it never happened. all we are arguing about are hypotheticals. so for me, it is meaningless in trying to elevate zidane`s career status or being `sympathetic` towards what actually happened, as in reality.

however, you seem to think that the `galacticos`were a `star-studded`team. so in reality, zidane did have the opportunity to play on a team full of star talent just as `xavi and iniesta`played together. if that is the case, then i still do not see zidane as dominant as xavi and iniesta were for barcelona week in, week out.

again, arguing over whether zidane was as effective in late 2003 as in early 2003 is futile. in the same way that one person will think messi`s best season is 10/11 and i could make the point that it was 16/17. in any case he won the world player of the year in 2003 at real madrid.
i can debate with you that the so called `galacticos`were not as good as perceived based on their prior prime years and how real madrid did in relation to a team like Valencia for example. but to give zidane credited he was not overshadowed or frozen by the environment of the `galactico`situation.

by `those Balon d`or positions` that were not achieved in non NT tournament years, are you referring to the ones that zidane won in 98 and 2000 that consisted of the World Cup 98 and Euro 2000

 

Not a problem.

You compared the dominance achieved by Xavi and Iniesta together during the 08-12 timeframe, with that achieved by Zidane during his peak years, and concluded that Xavi and Iniesta were more dominant. I understood this to mean that in terms of their team's overall win %, trophy count and big results, they were ahead of Zidane. Messi certainly played an important role in helping Xavi and Iniesta achieve those results, as did they for him and for each other. Of course, this was helped immensely by the fact that no other team of their era had a comparable cast of players, due to the lack of parity of competition and availability of talent. And IMO, which player stood out among the three while doing this, is an entirely different aspect as far as I am concerned.

As for the galacticos and Zidane's time with them. To begin with, they were not quite as far ahead of the rest of the teams of their era as was Barcelona 08-12, in spite of their players being superstars, simply due to their era having more parity of competition as compared to the 08-12 timeframe. And the galacticos were still winning big titles every year till the time that the stability and balance of the team was retained i.e. till the end of the 02/03 season. Beyond that, the mismanagement of the squad meant that they burned out before the end of the season in 03/04, and due to their ages, couldn't ever really recover again.

I was speaking specifically of Zidane during the 03/04 season till Feb-Mar 2004, and I provided evidence to backup my opinion regarding him as well. The WPTOY or Balon d'Or are not good measures for this aspect, since the time of his great form in late 2003 and early 2004 would not be considered in the 2003 awards and would be overshadowed by the end-of-season failures with RM for the 2004 awards.

Also the team was doing pretty well too, since the galacticos had a 10 point lead at the top of la liga, were in the CdR final while being matched up against Monaco in the CL QF, by February 2004. So they were actually on course for a double and even a possible treble. However, the fact that they couldn't maintain that momentum was more down to them having a very thin bench, and having played too many games and minutes (for that era), to compensate for that thin bench. Considering their ages and the susceptibility to injuries for some of the key players, this proved disastrous at the end of the season.

Sure and 2006 as well.

My point was that his Balon d'Or positions in 1997 and 2003 (as well as 2002), were not coloured by any NT heroics, at least not to a considerable degree, and were won more clearly on the back of his club performances. Though they were impacted by him not playing as the focal point of his club teams.

 

@PuckVanHeel

Reading again my explanations on Zidane, it wasn't all that well explained, nor well written for that matter. But to correct and/or rephrase some of the points I made:

Zidane was the ideal player for an era defined by camera-based perception. On the other hand, Cristiano Ronaldo is the ideal player for an era defined by social media perception. Most fans are not artistically fluid enough and/or not experienced enough to fully understand just how night-and-day the camera-based improvements were at that precise moment in time. It was a genuine revolution, in the one sport that could truly be revolutionized by camera work.

Basketball being a small court, became a better defined picture quality television product, but the camera style itself remained essentially the same be that in the 1980s or the 1990s or to this day. With football, because it is a fragmented sport played on a massive pitch, the change in camera style was a real revolution; I think it dramatically changed how players themselves are perceived. Before Zidane, having 'style' was just that: it was easy on the eyes, but it didn't systematically defined the overall perceived quality of the player. After Zidane, having 'style' became a systematic sign of the overall perceived quality/superiority of the player. The social media era was not as sophisticated as Zidane's era was, in terms of the attention to the detail in the camera work, the replays, etc. There's a lot of great runs by Messi, where the replay is artistically mediocre in quality. There's a lot of great runs by Iniesta, where there wasn't even a replay to be shown. In Zidane's era, the love for that camera-based art, was much more systematic, much more consistent in my esteem, than it has been in Messi/Ronaldo's era.

I think that Zinedine Zidane played in the greatest camera-art era of all time, which inflates his perception in a highly unique way. I don't think any other sport has been revolutionized purely by camera-work, the way football was revolutionized in the mid 1990s. That will always reflect well on Zidane, who became the face of a high-quality-art era. I think football will in essence circle back to that era, sooner rather than later.

The part in bold is harsh and not truly representative of my opinion. More a result of wanting to write my conclusion very quickly, instead of thinking it over more patiently. Regarding some of those players, I think that R9 1996-1998 and Figo 1998-2000 were really great players. Totti is more difficult to measure for me, but he also often looks to me like a player who could've been really great, had he played for better clubs. Alessandro Del Piero, Zinedine Zidane, and Pavel Nedved, are players that -- as club players -- I do not rate as highly as R9, Figo, and Totti.

But overall: my point was that Zidane, at club level, just simply fell short of what he could do in some of the big games that he played at NT level. And most importantly: I think it is demonstrable that the reason why Zidane arguably 'fell short' at club level, is because Zidane was not particular great when he had to fight a fair fight. At NT level it wasn't a fair fight in my opinion; Figo played for a demonstrably inferior Portugal; R9 was never fit nor healthy when he played vs. Zidane's France; Rivaldo had an unfit R9 when he played France (and having an unfit striker will tend to have bad consequences for players like Rivaldo, who depend a lot on the off-the-ball activity of the striker/strikers at the front); Nedved played for the Czech Republic; Del Piero was out of form at WC 1998; etc. This is not at all exclusive to Zidane, and it is one of the big reasons as to why I'm not a big fan of the World Cup; I mean, I don't dislike the WC, but I do dislike how Zidane becomes universally better than Ronaldinho, on the basis of one game where Ronaldinho was nullified by fat R9's lack of activity. The World Cup simply isn't a fair fight on average, for many different reasons.

Furthermore, when Zidane played vs. a healthy Totti at Euro 2000; Totti soundly outclassed Zidane, and Totti should've had 2 assists to his name in that Final (I think it was Del Piero who failed to score those 2 clear-cut chances). When Zidane played vs. a healthy R9 in the Serie A; R9 soundly outclassed Zidane. When Zidane played vs. Pavel Nedved in a UCL Semi Final; Nedved clearly was the better performer. When the fight was fair, it was not rare to see how Zidane was repeatedly outclassed by supposedly 'lesser' players. And unlike players like Messi, Ronaldo, R9, Totti, Figo -- Zidane never really was a consistent player when he played against the inferior clubs, i.e., Zidane really needed to show up in those 'big games', because Zidane wasn't as consistently great as those other players were outside of the so-called big games.

In my opinion, Zidane's big games weren't great enough to compensate for that disparity. Maybe had Zidane outclassed a healthy R9 in the World Cup Final (1998). Maybe had Zidane also outclassed a healthy R9 at club level (1998). But in a fair fight, the big games by Zidane rarely happened. That's perhaps my biggest criticism against Zidane. (On the other hand, if CR7 is good enough to become a Top 10 all timer, then Zidane being perceived as a Top 10 all timer sounds so much more reasonable in my opinion.)

 

Thanks for your reply and answer.

Yes, I agree that more and better coverage is not necessarily negative for a player. On the other hand, thanks to this coverage everyone has imprinted in their minds that Zidane has been sent off 14 times in his career, while the 33 times of Sivori (as well as his perceived inconsistency relative to his own time), on some crucial moments too, are now only found in old books. It has two swords.

I can also see Zidane being 'better' in the 1980s, because he would have had more space in the 1980s Serie A midfields (not talking about early 1980s La Liga and their hackjob here...). In the 1990s he had to run and 'fight' harder and more intense for his ideal midfield position against the Desailly's and Di Biaggio's of this world. Those 'best midfield positions' weren't automatically granted any more. That scoring became a little bit easier does not automatically mean playing in midfield became a lot easier. His goal-tally is also not really inflated (by 40% in some cases) with penalties.

Yes there was also the fouling (don't know how he would react to this) but the whole 'marking' has sometimes been blown out of proportion. If we just assume and agree with that Maradona was the defining player of the 1980s (not an earth-shaking insight) then we see many instances where he wasn't man marked (Brazil 1982, England 1986, Belgium 1986, Italy 1990) or where the opposition did not assign their best or 2nd best marker to him (West Germany 1986, Italy 1986, West Germany 1990). Very often the best and most disciplined marker was tied to the center forward (or two center forwards). That's often how those things played out.
Of course Zidane 'never' experienced a Gentile, that is the other side.

6 - Claudio Gentile committed 6 fouls in the 1982 World Cup match between Italy and Argentina – all of them on Diego Maradona. Man-marking.

— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) March 26, 2010

John Foot his excellent Calcio book (2007):




I don't say Zidane *must* be among the game's very greats (you mention some good points of him vs his peers in his own time) but I can imagine that he - as 100% midfielder (not a semi-forward as Maradona/Platini were) - played in the wrong decade, also compared to now.

At any rate, thanks for the reply. That was what I meant yes

Also watched those two videos now. While I frequently disagreed with how and on who it is applied, it touches on some good things and concrete/tangible points.

 

1)now we are really getting off topic! and i won`t refer to this topic after this. to be fair i was unfair about comparing zico at a later age. however, 30 years old isn`t exactly old. considering that you consider zidane so highly after he hit 30, i don`t think that is a bad year to compare the level of any player. i never saw zico play at udinese, so i can`t judge him for what he did there. however, i recently saw that the 2 years that zico joined, napoli went down further each year and were better off before zico joined.

2) before maradona joined napoli, they were in 12th place in the league. maradona`s performances in italy were top class a number of times! i don`t know if that were the same case for zico at udinese. to be fair to zico, udinese were not the same team that maradona`s napoli were at in terms of having a chance to win trophies. but don`t forget aside from argentina, maradona won the serie a, twice! and the serie a was a legitimate league of competition, i think we can agree on that. maradona was a purely around player even at napoli! if anything maradona underperformed at national level. copa americas, even at WC 90 he was only a shadow of himself.

i was going to go into club level for some of these players but players as cruyff, eusebio, pele, etc. for example could be highly regarded at club level even without world cups. but forget that going back to NTs
what the world cups of these players such as maradona, eusebio, garrincha, and jairzinho do show us is their maximum peak level. zidane never even came miles within these guys at any level including NT. you regard zidane`s natinal team performances so highly, talking about how if he had the same role at club he would be sooo highly regarded! even if that were the case, none of zidane`s NT performances (at supposedly peak level) even come close to being close with the peak of the performances of the players mentioned above!

dude! are you serious! you just spent pages and pages talking about how zidane never played at peak level for his clubs because he never played the same role for the national team. now you are saying that zidane is considered so highly despite making an impact on the NT when that is actually the fact that he is regarded so highly, because of his NT victories!

are you serious!!!! did you even watch zidane`s performances against barcelona in the semifinals in 2002??? in the away leg against barcelona that he scored he was extremely quiet. and with all due respect had no influence on the game outside of the goal. even in the home leg against barcelona, he had very little if any influence on the outcome of the game. even in the final against leverkusen, with all due respect, taking away that left footed volley... is there anything in that game that show you zidane could have had a stellar tournament in 2002??? take an honest look. even in the quarterfinals performances against bayern munich they were good (both legs), but nothing to show that he would have surely been stellar in 2002. i don`t doubt that he could have had a good WC 2002 performance but you are acting like every NT tournament that zidane plays is an automatic stellar performance.
again, you are purely speculating!!! if pele doesn´t get any sympathy for what could have been a potentially great WC in 62, then neither should zidane but you seem to think otherwise.

 

no, no, no. when i talk about xavi and iniesta being dominant in the midfield in a way that zidane never was at club level, i am talking about that xavi and iniesta were so important that several people believed that the 2 of them were what made barcelona, essentially barcelona. don`t forget how people were actually questioning messi`s worth without xavi and iniesta. something that messi has only proved since xavi was on the older side in 2014. and this is not an affect that zidane had at club level. for this reason, is it so difficult for me to choose between iniesta and zidane as better players or rather more dominant midfielders, and iniesta has a legitimate case to hae the upper hand.

 

Woah. I think you are really underselling what Zico achieved with Flamengo before his move to Udinese. The guy was a three time South American Player of the Year and a runner-up twice more, when competing with the likes of Maradona, Rivellino, Falcao, Figueroa, etc.

Also, comparing him with Zidane at the same age is very strange. Unlike Zidane he was a playmaking forward, one who also had his fare share of fitness issues. So 30 was actually pretty old for him, especially when considering other aspects like the culture shock of playing in Europe for the first time.

Why even bring in Zidane here considering that those players themselves i.e. Maradona, Garrincha, Jairzinho never came close to their peak WC performances in any of their other World Cups, even though all of them had at least one more attempt at a World Cup at full fitness (Eusebio and Cryuff pnly played one so can't comment about them).

Or better yet, let us take the example of Platini. He played in 3 WCs and 1 Euro with the Euro occurring during his absolute peak. In the Euro he scored 9 goals in 5 games. Compared to this, in the other three tournaments, he had 5 goals in 14 games. And you will see this same pattern repeating for players like Maradona, Garrincha, Jairzinho, etc. So my point is pretty self evident i.e. most NT greats had one exceptionally high scoring NT tournament, and that occurred during their peaks.

Seems you didn't understand a word of what I wrote. Let me put it in another form, something easier for you to comprehend,

[Zidane WC Career] - [Peak WC Tournament (missed out due to injury)] = Many other NT Greats' Full WC Career (which includes peak WC tournament)​

You have a penchant for missing my point it seems.

The numbers I quoted show that Zidane was in good enough nick, to be the difference maker for his team in high pressure, end of tournament international club games, wherein it would be difficult for any player to make a difference. He does that again in the World Cup a month later, and it frankly doesn't matter if he is spectacular or not for the rest of those end-of-tournament World Cup games. He would still be considered to have had a stellar tournament.

And I don't deny that the above is simply speculation (though pretty sound at that), but I am not even asking you to go with it. You can simply flip the stakes, by applying the same disadvantage that Zidane faced (in being injured for the WC tournament that occurred during his absolute peak), to other NT greats. If you do that, their WC NT careers suddenly start looking a lot less impressive, since most of them only had one great WC tournament each and these tournaments generally were the ones that occurred during their respective peaks.

Ok. But even if many people were talking like that i.e. of Xavi and Iniesta being more important, they certainly never put their money where their mouth was i.e. figuratively. Thus Messi still continued to remain ahead of Xavi and Iniesta when you consider how people like journalists voted for ESM appearances, Balon d'Or positions, UEFA Club footballer of the year awards, etc. in non-NT tournament years. So the reality is that Messi was still considered more important for that period of domination i.e. 08-12, by most voters, if you made them pick between him and Xavi/Iniesta.

Zidane on the other hand actually managed to get recognised by journalists and other voters, ahead of his teammates, when it came to these awards (being ahead on 2 out of 3 of those counts in non-NT tournament years like 97 and 03). So even if his teams won less, he was considered more important to those wins than his teammates; while Xavi/Iniesta were not considered so when compared to their's. Not to mention that Xavi/Iniesta actually had each other to help them during that period of domination, while Zidane didn't have another player of his calibur playing alongside him, to help him dominate. Which makes considering Xavi/Iniesta as more dominant at club level, quite problematic.

 

i am not debating zico`s ability. you were only asking me why zico isn`t compared on the same level as pele by the general public. you said it was because he didn`t win a world cup but cruyff also did not win a world cup. as a matter of fact, without him, holland went to the finals of the world cup the next year. you know who did win the world cup is mario kempes. he has no place in the greatest players in the game although he has one of the greatest performances in world cup history. a player who played at a level that zidane was not close to reaching in any NT tournament.
the fact that players like cruyff and zico played on NT that will probably be more remembered than 95% of other NTs despite not winning it should not tarnish zico`s legacy. this is why i brought up the situation of how he did in europe for udinese. apart from that, another reason could be the fact that i don`t believe they (flamingo) played any where near as many european teams as pele did. and pele has a good statistical and winning percentage against such (european) teams. european play is hugely regarded into pele`s status with many people but his record is good. of course, zico played spectacular against a very good liverpool side in a victory. but even with that, how often did they play the best european teams from the best countries? that is why i think he is not regarded as highly among the general public.

it`s actually not that strange. at an older age he was playing closer to goal than zinedine zidane was at real madrid. on the NT, zidane played wherever he wanted so that was his decision. in any case, the situation for zico at udinese is unclear. perhaps i should watch games at his time there to get a better idea. and there were probably other situations happening with the team to explain why Udinese went down lower each time that he played there.

this is another debate. consistency! if you want to bring up consistency than yes, zidane was better than a lot of these players at the NT level. if that is your consensus for putting zidane above the likes of maradona, eusebio, and garrincha then so be it. consistency is the same reason that CR7 is voted as arguably a top 10 all time great after his career is finished. not because of his all round game as a top 10 player but because of his consistency (in the same way i see Ronaldinho as a better player than CR7, but due to Ronaldinho`s shorter level of high play i put CR7 in front)
However, i believe most people will judge the best players on peak 1st, and then consistency. the same reason maradona is regarded so highly. for this reason, i struggle to put zidane as a top 20. but there is nothing wrong with your viewpoint if that`s how you want to judge. you just have a different criteria than i do. i just don`t think he ever dominated enough at either level to be considered top 20 or rather above Iniesta. that`s no knock on Zidane. remember, we are talking top 20 of any player that has ever played! he (zidane) is an elite all time player for a fact.

should`ve, would`ve, could`ve. again, i don`t care about what zidane could`ve done in 2002 if he didn`t have an injury. all i care about is what he actually did. so WC 2002 is irrelevant.

you have a penchant for over emphasizing what could have been.
side note: in business and life in general, if you can`t explain your point across to someone else in a clear manner than that is your fault. don`t blame your audience for not being able to understand. you just didn`t get your message across in a clear manner. it seems you are assuming that everyone should have the same assumptions that you have instead of making it understandable to everyone.

i don´t doubt for a second that zidane could and would show up in big games and big moments. where we disagree on is what is considered `stellar`. it seems you have a different interpreation of the word. when i think of `stellar`, i think of the best of the best. the only time i would consider coming up with moments here and there as stellar without actually taking over games is what Cr7 did in this years champions league in the knockout stages.

i can`t believe you are even bringing this up. the fact that iniesta and xavi could even be mentioned in the same breath as messi is an achievement by itself. and not just for one season. you are comparing, messi, who scores 40, 50+ goals a season, with players like iniesta and xavi who don`t even hit the double digits!!! the only way that could be is if you are completely dominating the midfield on an unprecedented level! considering that messi is arguably on the same level as maradona and pele.
compared to the environment of inesta and xavi competing with messi, zidane is a big fish in a small pond.
and don`t forget, that with iniesta and xavi as the star players on the NT, they did something that no other NT has done. Win a Euro, WC, and another Euro in consecutive years.

 

Good lord. There was no should've, would've, could've in that formula whatsoever. It had only three aspects i.e.
1) Zidane's WC career
2) Injury drastically impacted Zidane's peak WC tournament
3) Other greats' full WC careers
The only reason I lined them up in a formula was so you would stop missing the point. Since without going into speculation at all, it is entirely factual to simply state that - Zidane's WC career (not including his performance during the WC that occurred at his peak) is equivalent to or better than the WC career of most other NT greats (although for them it includes their performances during the WCs that occurred at their peaks).

Where is the speculation in any of this?

The only reason Zico was brought up was because you yourself played the could've, would've, should've card to try and dismiss 3 months from Zidane's career (although in this post you try to suggest that you don't use this type of reasoning at all and like to stick to what actually occurred).

In response to you playing the above card, I brought in Pele's career and dismissed 2 months from it as an exercise, and in the process made an offhand comment by suggesting that Pele's career would, after dismissing those 2 months, then be slightly superior to but still very similar to Zico's career. So I never asked "why Zico isn't compared on the same level as Pele", at any point in time.

Anyway, you really need to talk to some actual Brazilian old timers if you think Zico's legacy was not tarnished by not winning a WC with 'that' Brazilian team. It's utter speculation on your part and mostly based on incorrect assumptions at that, considering your lack of knowledge on the subject.

And btw,
flamingo = a bird
Flamengo = the football club

Where Zidane played on the field when featuring for his NT, was his own decision to an extent, yes. But since you prefer to go with what actually happened (and not speculate), you should stick to the fact that Zidane actually decided to and did play in midfield for his NT. It's for the sake of maintaining a level of fairness to the debate, you see.

Anyway, the point was that Zico didn't move further ahead when he got older. Zico was always a playmaking forward (very similar to Messi in fact) and scored a ton of goals from that position, including a career high 65 goals in 51 club games in 1979 when he was at his peak. Plus his injury issues brought in too many variables as he got older. So it was indeed very strange of you to compare him with the Zidane of age 30 (i.e. a midfield playmaker who was at his absolute peak at that older age).

And here I thought you firmly believed that Zidane was one inconsistent dude.

But let's leave that inconsistency in your beliefs aside for the moment. Since after reading the above, all I can say is that you actually seem to think that there is no advantage to being able to feature in a WC tournament at one's playing peak. Instead, you seem to think it is only a matter of consistency. I personally find this line of thinking very odd.

The other possibility being that my current audience doesn't have either the intelligence or the concentration needed to grasp all of what I write.

You mentioned earlier in case of Kempes, as him having reached a level in WC 78 that Zidane was not close to reaching in any of his NT tournaments. How much was it by, as you allege, "my" definition of 'stellar' vs "your" definition of 'stellar'? Considering that, Zidane created 43% more chances and had 60% more passes, per 90 mins, in WC 98. I mean, I would like to understand how Kempes was "taking over" games more in 78 vs what Zidane did in 98, while being involved much less in buildup play, as seen from the above stats.

I think the truth is that you used "my" definition of 'stellar' when stating that Kempes had "one of the greatest performances in World Cup history". You are just not willing to allow me to use that definition for Zidane for his CL 02 performance. And yeah, Kempes is another great example of a player who had a stellar WC tournament at his peak (considering that he had had a 39 goal season in 77-78), but who never came close to that level in any other NT tournament that he featured in i.e. WC 74, CA75 or WC 82.

So Zidane was a big fish in a small pond, eh? Lol.

Considering that Xavi (and many of his peers) could only get recognised as a great once these small pond fishes had all retired, I guess I don't buy the above narrative at all. It is rather more likely that Xavi and Iniesta benefited from an era of less overall talent, lowered competition and little parity, once the greats of Zidane's generation had grown old or retired.

This is because, for me it is inconceivable that a player so great as you make him out to be above, is unable to get even a single Balon d'Or ranking appearance, till he reached an age of 28. After all, don't a lot of Barcelona fans insist that Xavi has always been playing at a high level from quite a way back i.e. before 2008? So, was it a Messi between ages 11 to 21 that was supposed to be stopping Xavi from getting more recognition, during that period between his club senior debut in 98 and his first Balon d'Or ranking appearance in 08?

 

came across this on reddit, thought it was interesting



A defence of Zidane's historical position against common misconceptions propogated by stat obsessed revisionists

Zidane never showed anything near the display of tactical intelligence possessed by M. Laudrup, and Iniesta. He was never the best at making key passes, organizing the midfield and was a bit of a ballhog. In 98 France, this was compensated by Deschamps who organized the midfield, and in Juve and RM, he had several other world-class players to tactically organize the game when needed, like Conte, Davids, Figo, Hierro, even compatriot Makelele. Nedved himself, brought to Juve to replace Zidane, played better for them between 2003 and 2005 than Zizou ever did. People who never watched him week after week forget that.

The fact that Zidane played with DMs isn't exactly a concrete example of any tactical ineptness on his part, since he was a classic 10. The role is kind of lost on the current generation who is used to watching teams play 4-3-3s, but to surmise, a player playing such a role in those days was actually given the task of controlling the tempo of the game and moving the ball vertically/horizontally as required, from a tactical perspective. The DMs were generally used to stop the opposition from playing by recovering balls and cycling them back to their own number 10, to start a new chain of playmaking. Hence the term 'water carrier' as used by Cantona for Deschamps.

Furthermore, if Zidane was indeed so tactically limited, then I really doubt that he would be consistently asked to play such a tactically crucial role (without being dropped mind you for big games, unlike for instance Laudrup who was famously dropped for the 94CL final by a coach like Cruyff) for teams being coached by managers who are themselves considered to be very adept tacticians i.e. guys like Lippi, Ancellotti, etc. One would think, they would notice these fallacies in Zidane's game. Oh, and it isn't as if Zidane never featured in such a role in a big game, since he played as a deep lying playmaker/dm for Juventus in their demolition of Milan at the San Siro in the 96/97 season. It's just that Lippi soon figured out that Zidane was even better as a classic 10.

As for the anecdote regarding Nedved, well, when Zidane left for Real Madrid, Juventus used that money to not only buy Nedved, but Buffon and Thuram as well (so it wasn't just Nedved's effect which helped them achieve success). And even after that, they still reached only one CL final vs the two reached during Zidane's time. Domestically as well, in both their tenures Juventus have 2 Serie A titles (since the other 2 for Nedved were revoked due to Calciopoli, but then Zidane's Juventus ended up losing 2 Serie A titles i.e. in 99/00 and 00/01, in controversial circumstances on the last day of each of those two seasons as well, so it evens out).

After his 2006 sendoff his popularity with casual and new football fans exploded, alongside thousands of youtube highlight reels showcasing his godly first touch and ball control. And this retroactively built a Zidane vs Brazilian Ronaldo manufactured rivalry, when everyone that actively watched football in the 90s knows that Ronaldo was miles above Zidane at the time, and the comparisons between them are actually between Zidane and post-injury Ronaldo.

Zidane v Ronaldo started in 97/98, wherein they competed for the Serie A and World Cup titles. Guess who won both of them, and no R9 was not injured in the Serie A that season but the next, though he did suffer from that seizure during the World Cup final. And yes, obviously the 2006 World Cup helped Zidane's popularity and his performance against Brazil was a major influence on fans watching at that time, but that was simply a result of the improbability of it, considering that a 34 year old bossed a game involving a 2 time former Ballon d'Or winner, the reigning Ballon d'Or winner and the soon to be anointed Ballon d'Or winner. So the rivalry wasn't manufactured post retirement, but was a product of the two best players of that generation being pitted against one another in two separate world cups and a league campaign.

Lastly, there was a time before Ronaldo got injured when he was absolutely unplayable and definitely and rightly considered the best player in the world, above even Zidane. But it is also true that at that time Zidane was not at his peak yet, which he reached during the 2000-2002 period. Sadly, Ronaldo was injured by then and thus a direct comparison of the players at their peaks was never made possible.

He's often credited for the 98 WC even though he played average, was sent off in the group stage and only hit 2 headers from set pieces in the final. People are fooled by his elegant game, but older fans know that he did absolutely nothing up to the Final, and Djorkaeff was widely regarded as France's most dangerous player. In club football, he's often remembered for the volley against Leverkusen and RM highlight compilations, but what they don't show is that Zidane never, ever had a single truly proficient season where he shined throughout. On this regard, Iniesta is a much more consistent player the team can always rely on.

For a player who didn't do much in world cup 98, it surely is surprising that he was the highest rated offensive player (2nd highest overall behind Thuram) with minimum 5 games played, by kicker magazine (a relatively dependable source for NT tournament player ratings) for the 98 World Cup. Source - http://www.kicker.de/news/fussball/w...er-saison.html or that the Argentinean EL Grafico magazine considered him to be their player of the tournament. Source - https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/how...#post-28566702

As for entire seasons where Zidane shined throughout, you can have your pick of 95/96 (33 goals+assists out of 88 goals scored by the team) , 00/01 (20 goals+assists out of 72 goals scored by the team) and 02/03 (29 goals+assists out of 141 goals scored by his team). His teams might have ended up short on trophies in those seasons, except in case of 02/03 when they won La Liga, but statistically, his impact on his team's goalscoring in those seasons is easily comparable to the consistent best that Iniesta can offer. And in case of seasons wherein Zidane played for offensively weaker teams, it actually makes his contributions more valuable to his team's fortunes.

He's somehow credited as a "big game player" even though he only showed up for 2 finals in his whole career, and went invisible in most of the others:

1996 UEFA cup final - invisible, gets destroyed at home, team loses
1997 CL final - invisible, his team loss (the same team that had won it in 1996 without him)
1998 CL final - invisible, his team loses
1998 WC final - clutch, scores 2 headers from set pieces after being average the entire tournament, team wins
2000 Euro final - invisible, team wins because he's bailed out by Wiltord and Trezeguet (Zidane not involved in their goals)
2002 CL final - clutch, team wins
2002 CdR final - invisible, team loses
2004 CdR final - invisible, team loses against a lower mid table side
2006 WC final - chokes and gets sent off, team loses

All that the above list shows is that if Zidane didn't absolutely take control and win the final for his team by scoring goals, they generally lost it (apart from the Euro 00 final and even there he had better overall stats than both Henry and Totti, both of whom are considered to have had a better game than him by his detractors and were the respective motms for their teams). Which shows how the "he always played with superior teammates" argument is also a bit of a fallacy (at least for cup finals).

In any case, if you hold say Xavi to that same scale, for instance, and give him the same handicap with regards to his teammates, he would have a lot lesser volume of major trophies to show for all his brilliant play, considering that he never scored in any major final. Point is, that you have to understand that Zidane was a midfielder, and so scoring was not always possible for him. And if his teammates also did not score from the chances he provided for them, it was hardly his fault. He was definitely not "invisible" in all those games you listed, as for instance I pointed out in case of Euro 00, or as is the case for the 97 CL final wherein he hit the post and also had a pre-assist. Thus there are some clear hyperboles in that above mentioned list almost like saying Xavi was invisible for the WC 2010 final.

For your reference, below is a list of big game goals by Zidane -

Stage Tournament Year Goals
Final European Cup 2002 1
Semi Final European Cup 2003 1
Semi Final European Cup 2002 1
Semi Final European Cup 1998 1
Semi Final European Cup 1997 1
Semi Final Euro 2000 1
Final World Cup 2006 1
Final World Cup 1998 2
Semi Final World Cup 2006 1

Source - http://www.averageopposition.com/201...-findings.html , which is a blog that has a compilation of players' goals scored in major international tournament finals and semi finals and awards points accordingly to said players (Zidane is 5th in that list btw).

In addition to the above, below is a list of his indirect goal involvements in big games drawn as per the same criteria as above,
So, if you consider direct assists as per the big games that the blog is counting, he has,
1 vs Slavia Prague in the SF in E3 1996
2 vs Ajax in E1 in the SF in E1 1997
1 vs Manchester United in the SF in E1 1999
1 vs Barcelona in the SF in E1 2002

And, if you also consider pks won, pre-assists and setups, all leading to goals, he has,
1 setup vs Ajax in the SF in E1 1997
1 pre-assist vs Borussia Dortmund in the F in E1 1997
1 pk won vs Monaco in the SF in E1 1998
1 setup vs Croatia in the SF in WC 1998
1 pre-assist vs Manchester United in E1 1999

The above are from my own memory, so if you want to cross check, best to try and find the video highlights of the respective games.

In any case, the above together come to 20 goals he was a contributor to in 23 games in the Semis and Finals of the major international tournaments that he featured in. That's more than either Xavi or Iniesta and approximately close to what Messi's numbers look like, from what I recollect as having counted (cannot find the post right now), when looking at their goal involvement across a similar criteria of games.

Another little known fact: Zidane only ever gave 1 assist to Henry in their entire tenure with the France NT. And it was from a set piece. This is supposed to be the playmaker that defined a generation? No, I don't think so. He played his whole career as a bona fide #10, but he has a pitiable goal+assist/game ratio that doesn't even compare to modern #10s like James Rodríguez (ironically), De Bruyne, Fabregas and Ozil, let alone the true greats of yesteryear, like his contemporaries Nedved, Rivaldo, Del Piero, Ronaldo or Figo, who all put up far superior contributions to their teams in all of goals, assists, actual playmaking, be it from the center or from the wing. To put numbers to a single example, which I selected because of the similar amount of games:

Zidane
played 231 times in 5 seasons for Real Madrid, always as an AM
scored 49 goals, including 9 in the CL/Supercup
made 51 assists, including 10 in the CL/Supercup
played 108 times for France though his career, with 31 goals (including penalties) and 29 assists
Rivaldo
played 235 times in 5 seasons for Barcelona, as an LW (which he disliked) and as an AM
scored 130 goals, including 31 (THIRTY ONE) in the CL/Supercup
made 50 assists, including 6 in the CL/Supercup
played 79 times for Brazil, with 37 goals and 18 assists, not a penalty-taker

First of all, Zidane did not always play as an AM for RM. Especially during 03/04 and 04/05, he was mostly forced out wide (to the left), to accomodate Beckham in the center of midfield, since Figo would not relinquish his right midfield spot, even though he could play on the left side almost just as well. Rivaldo on the other hand played as a forward as well as an AM and sometimes a LW.

Secondly, he did not take all PKs and FKs for Real Madrid, or even most of them, unlike Rivaldo did for Barcelona. Figo took almost all of them, leaving a tiny amount for Zidane, thus drastically impacting his goal numbers as well as assist numbers. Also, Rivaldo did take pks for Brazil e.g., he took the regular time pks against Russia, Uruguay, Turkey and Peru (off the top of my head), so saying he was not a penalty taker for his country is quite the lie. In fact, I find it worrying that the pk point is mentioned for Zidane when he had all of 19 career PKs while it is not mentioned for Rivaldo who had 65 (both including PSOs).

Thirdly, the French NT unlike the Brazilian was not setup to score goals, but was primarily a defensive side. This hindered Zidane's goal and assist output at an NT level.

Considering the above handicaps, Zidane actually did quite well for himself in terms of the numbers he put up, especially at NT level.

Lastly, for the case with Henry, there are a few things that need to be considered,
1) Zidane did assist Henry during the Euro 00 as well, in addition to doing it in WC 06, though the first one was a goal more made by Henry dribbling than the pass from Zidane, which was routine
2) Apart from those assists though, there were a number of opportunities that Zidane provided to Henry which he couldn't capitalise on when playing for the French NT. Ten of these are listed here (although there are definitely more) - https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/cri...#post-31340027
3) Zidane's playmaking had a pronounced indirect effect on Henry's scoring, in that it enabled the same. This can be seen if we look at the matches played by Henry from his debut till his 85th cap (vs Italy in WC 06, when Zidane retired), and look at his gpg while playing with Zidane and without Zidane,

Games featuring both Henry & Zidane - Games 56* / Henry Goals 25 / Henry GPG 0.45
Games featuring Henry but not Zidane - Games 29 / Henry Goals 11 / Henry GPG 0.38

Considering the same numbers as above only for NT tournaments,

Games featuring both Henry & Zidane - Games 18/ Henry Goals 10/ Henry GPG 0.55
Games featuring Henry but not Zidane - Games 6 / Henry Goals 1 / Henry GPG 0.17

Sources -
http://www.rsssf.com/miscellaneous/henry-intlg.html
http://www.rsssf.com/miscellaneous/zidane-intl.html

So during the time that Zidane was active i.e. till Henry's 85th cap, Henry had a significantly better gpg with him in the team than without him there and this was even more pronounced when playing in NT tournaments.

Thus ultimately, in case of the Zidane-Henry partnership, Zidane definitely did do enough to get more assists for Henry and was also definitely a positive influence on Henry's goalscoring, especially in major NT tournaments.

Yet somehow, all this highlights-based revisionism twists Zidane into somehow a better, more productive, more efficient, more legendary player than Rivaldo - a player with EIGHTY goals more than Zidane in a similar time-frame, playing in the same position. The exact same evaluation can be made for Totti (a MUCH better playmaker than Zidane ever was, whose passing, goals/assists tally and capacity to run a game at his prime were like three whole levels above Zizou's), Figo (also a much better playmaker, whose record of La Liga assists wasn't broken until Messi), Del Piero and Nedved (both better for Juve than Zidane ever was), Rui Costa (who was better in Serie A than Zidane, particularly for Fiorentina) and many, many other great, even better players who were simply marginalized by Zidane's two WC goals in the 98 Final, which FIFA and UEFA saw as an opportunity to market and big-up Zidane as some sort of Europe's answer to Ronaldo - his post-WC poster-boyism, his natural skill and elegance in ball control and his later move to the original Galacticos Madrid lending credibility to this marketing campaign. His 1998 FIFA WPOTY and Ballon D'or were based simply on that one game, completely disregarding how he was invisible during the CL Final against Real Madrid in the same year or in all the other games of that very same World Cup. Of course, statistics are not the be-all end-all, but Zidane's lack of tactical nous, famous inconsistence (as great managers have said, "inconsistence" is just a lack of tactical knowledge and application. the best tacticians are always the most consistent players) and lack of awareness for the final pass put him just way too far behind other top #10s to disregard the gap between them.

The above, as far as I can tell, is a bit of a rant with,
1) Some really odd opinions, for instance, Totti's playmaking at his prime being 3 whole levels above Zidane, is something that I am not even sure is supposed to have any meaning, since it is impossible to calculate or measure in any way; or Del Piero and Nedved both being better for Juve than Zidane, though both together couldn't achieve as much at a continental level as Zidane did with just one of them, while having a similar domestic impact.
2) Or inane stat bashing, for instance Rivaldo/Figo are mentioned to have better goal tallies and assist tallies respectively. Well that's like saying that Iniesta is a poor player because during that same era, Ozil had a better assist tally and Rooney had a better goal tally. What I'm trying to point out is that Ozil takes almost all set-pieces for his teams, and does less playmaking and more final ball passing while Rooney plays as a forward just as often as he plays as a playmaker, unlike Iniesta, which helps these players improve their stats compared to Iniesta. Just like Figo and Rivaldo could do, when compared to Zidane. In big international games wherein their teams met though, like in the WC 98 or Euro 00, it was Zidane who came out on top with some top-drawer performances. And that makes the difference between era defining players and the rest.
3) And ultimately ending with the same inconsistency related Zidane bashing that I have addressed elsewhere in this post

Last but not least, the folks at Big Soccer have put together a very interesting compilation on Zidane's performances, trying to list all of his matches based on the ratings the press assigned to that week's game, with corresponding videos when available:
https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/zinedine-zidane-review-1996-2006.2006080 (highly recommended read)
Those who, unlike the older folks like me (30+), didn't see him week in, week out, this is a place as good as any to see how damned inconsistent, erratic and unspectacular he could be.

I was part of this rating exercise and first of all it was only done for 2 seasons i.e. 96/97 and 97/98. Furthermore, the "ratings" used are from a couple of Italian magazines which are unduly harsh on Zidane, especially when compared to how they rated homegrown talent like Del Piero.

 

Contiuned...


For more non-partisan ratings, democratically compiled by getting voted upon, ESM is a good source. ESM stands for European Sports Media and it is a forum of media outlets wherein they vote for and come out with monthy teams for club football performances. This started from 95/96 onwards. Messi and CRonaldo who are generally considered to have been very consistent, lead the pack with the most appearances for the current era, as well as overall. Guess who leads for the era during the time that Zidane played? Well overall it is Carlos who is way ahead of the pack at 34, and behind him on 2nd it is indeed Zidane with 24 appearances, who is also the offensive player (more difficult to get on the list than defensive players, for whom consistency is more easy to display) with the highest number of appearances for that era. Here is the list of teams between 95/96 and 07/08 - http://www.rsssf.com/miscellaneous/esm-xi.html. The player totals should be at this link (2011) - https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/esm...month.1693535/

Furthermore, if we look at Zidane's teammates when he was playing for his strongest club teams, and compare their performances with his by looking at ESM appearances, it becomes obvious who was the most consistent out of the lot,

ESM Season XI, Zidane and Club Teammates' Comparison -

Juventus
96-97: Del Piero(3), Deschamps(3), Fererra(3), Zidane(2), Peruzzi(2), Boksic(1), Vieri(1), Di Livio(1)
97-98: Zidane(5), Peruzzi(3), Del Piero(2), Inzaghi(1)
98-99: None
99-00: Zidane(2), Montero(2), Davids(1), Van Der Sar(1)
00-01: Zidane(2), Inzaghi(1)

Real Madrid
01-02: Zidane(5), Carlos(4), Raul(2), Morientes(1), Hierro(1), Helguera(1), Casillas(1)
02-03: Carlos(4), Zidane(3), Ronaldo(2), Raul(2), Helguera(1)
03-04: Zidane(4), Ronaldo(3), Beckham(2), Carlos(2), Casillas(2), Salgado(1)
04-05: Ronaldo(1)
05-06: Robinho(1)

The above voted on monthly ratings thus seem to paint a different picture regarding Zidane's consistency, to the one painted by the ratings provided by a few individual publications that you have linked to above. IIRC, if you consider Xavi (a midfielder who was considered to be very consistent while also being considered to be quite brilliant) for this same metric, then at the time that he left for Qatar he had a similar number of ESM monthly appearances to Zidane's. Iniesta though has slightly lesser appearances till date, again IIRC.

Zidane was a great player, for sure, but to put him in top 5s or top 10s in the history of football just reeks of revisionism based on idolized yet sparse highlights. Implying a player as inconsistent, ineffective, with relatively low end product and devoid of tactical finesse as Zidane is anywhere close to being a Top 10 player of all time is a crime to the history of football. In reality, he's barely top 50, if that. Platini was legitimately better, he just didn't deliver a WC - just ask older France or Juventus fans.

Where one puts Zidane is as per their own preference IMO. One can always hold certain qualities above others when forming a list, and the list thus created would reflect that preference.

Zidane being barely top 50 is lol-worthy though, and simply shows how the opinion behind the entire post is probably not something to be taken seriously. After all, it takes a special kind of preference to alternative facts, to suggest that a player who was man of the match in both World Cup and Champions League finals, has won best player of the season awards in three separate leagues, player of the tournament awards for 2 separate international NT tournaments and 1 international club tournament, won the overall player of the year awards on 4 separate years from 3 separate publications, made all time Euro and World Cup teams, won player of the decade from two separate publications and made the all time best XIs for two other publications, is barely top-50. I would dearly like to see a list of 50 players who are more widely decorated, individually. I understand individual awards are out of fashion since Messi and CRonaldo started winning all of them, but the sheer breadth of awards that Zidane has won (even if he might not have the volume), shows peers and observers acknowledging him across a very wide range of tournaments, seasons. and eras. Quite the feat for a barely top-50 player.
A defence of Zidane's historical position against common misconceptions propogated by stat obsessed revisionists

Zidane never showed anything near the display of tactical intelligence possessed by M. Laudrup, and Iniesta. He was never the best at making key passes, organizing the midfield and was a bit of a ballhog. In 98 France, this was compensated by Deschamps who organized the midfield, and in Juve and RM, he had several other world-class players to tactically organize the game when needed, like Conte, Davids, Figo, Hierro, even compatriot Makelele. Nedved himself, brought to Juve to replace Zidane, played better for them between 2003 and 2005 than Zizou ever did. People who never watched him week after week forget that.

The fact that Zidane played with DMs isn't exactly a concrete example of any tactical ineptness on his part, since he was a classic 10. The role is kind of lost on the current generation who is used to watching teams play 4-3-3s, but to surmise, a player playing such a role in those days was actually given the task of controlling the tempo of the game and moving the ball vertically/horizontally as required, from a tactical perspective. The DMs were generally used to stop the opposition from playing by recovering balls and cycling them back to their own number 10, to start a new chain of playmaking. Hence the term 'water carrier' as used by Cantona for Deschamps.

Furthermore, if Zidane was indeed so tactically limited, then I really doubt that he would be consistently asked to play such a tactically crucial role (without being dropped mind you for big games, unlike for instance Laudrup who was famously dropped for the 94CL final by a coach like Cruyff) for teams being coached by managers who are themselves considered to be very adept tacticians i.e. guys like Lippi, Ancellotti, etc. One would think, they would notice these fallacies in Zidane's game. Oh, and it isn't as if Zidane never featured in such a role in a big game, since he played as a deep lying playmaker/dm for Juventus in their demolition of Milan at the San Siro in the 96/97 season. It's just that Lippi soon figured out that Zidane was even better as a classic 10.

As for the anecdote regarding Nedved, well, when Zidane left for Real Madrid, Juventus used that money to not only buy Nedved, but Buffon and Thuram as well (so it wasn't just Nedved's effect which helped them achieve success). And even after that, they still reached only one CL final vs the two reached during Zidane's time. Domestically as well, in both their tenures Juventus have 2 Serie A titles (since the other 2 for Nedved were revoked due to Calciopoli, but then Zidane's Juventus ended up losing 2 Serie A titles i.e. in 99/00 and 00/01, in controversial circumstances on the last day of each of those two seasons as well, so it evens out).

After his 2006 sendoff his popularity with casual and new football fans exploded, alongside thousands of youtube highlight reels showcasing his godly first touch and ball control. And this retroactively built a Zidane vs Brazilian Ronaldo manufactured rivalry, when everyone that actively watched football in the 90s knows that Ronaldo was miles above Zidane at the time, and the comparisons between them are actually between Zidane and post-injury Ronaldo.

Zidane v Ronaldo started in 97/98, wherein they competed for the Serie A and World Cup titles. Guess who won both of them, and no R9 was not injured in the Serie A that season but the next, though he did suffer from that seizure during the World Cup final. And yes, obviously the 2006 World Cup helped Zidane's popularity and his performance against Brazil was a major influence on fans watching at that time, but that was simply a result of the improbability of it, considering that a 34 year old bossed a game involving a 2 time former Ballon d'Or winner, the reigning Ballon d'Or winner and the soon to be anointed Ballon d'Or winner. So the rivalry wasn't manufactured post retirement, but was a product of the two best players of that generation being pitted against one another in two separate world cups and a league campaign.

Lastly, there was a time before Ronaldo got injured when he was absolutely unplayable and definitely and rightly considered the best player in the world, above even Zidane. But it is also true that at that time Zidane was not at his peak yet, which he reached during the 2000-2002 period. Sadly, Ronaldo was injured by then and thus a direct comparison of the players at their peaks was never made possible.

He's often credited for the 98 WC even though he played average, was sent off in the group stage and only hit 2 headers from set pieces in the final. People are fooled by his elegant game, but older fans know that he did absolutely nothing up to the Final, and Djorkaeff was widely regarded as France's most dangerous player. In club football, he's often remembered for the volley against Leverkusen and RM highlight compilations, but what they don't show is that Zidane never, ever had a single truly proficient season where he shined throughout. On this regard, Iniesta is a much more consistent player the team can always rely on.

For a player who didn't do much in world cup 98, it surely is surprising that he was the highest rated offensive player (2nd highest overall behind Thuram) with minimum 5 games played, by kicker magazine (a relatively dependable source for NT tournament player ratings) for the 98 World Cup. Source - http://www.kicker.de/news/fussball/w...er-saison.html or that the Argentinean EL Grafico magazine considered him to be their player of the tournament. Source - https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/how...#post-28566702

As for entire seasons where Zidane shined throughout, you can have your pick of 95/96 (33 goals+assists out of 88 goals scored by the team) , 00/01 (20 goals+assists out of 72 goals scored by the team) and 02/03 (29 goals+assists out of 141 goals scored by his team). His teams might have ended up short on trophies in those seasons, except in case of 02/03 when they won La Liga, but statistically, his impact on his team's goalscoring in those seasons is easily comparable to the consistent best that Iniesta can offer. And in case of seasons wherein Zidane played for offensively weaker teams, it actually makes his contributions more valuable to his team's fortunes.

He's somehow credited as a "big game player" even though he only showed up for 2 finals in his whole career, and went invisible in most of the others:

1996 UEFA cup final - invisible, gets destroyed at home, team loses
1997 CL final - invisible, his team loss (the same team that had won it in 1996 without him)
1998 CL final - invisible, his team loses
1998 WC final - clutch, scores 2 headers from set pieces after being average the entire tournament, team wins
2000 Euro final - invisible, team wins because he's bailed out by Wiltord and Trezeguet (Zidane not involved in their goals)
2002 CL final - clutch, team wins
2002 CdR final - invisible, team loses
2004 CdR final - invisible, team loses against a lower mid table side
2006 WC final - chokes and gets sent off, team loses

All that the above list shows is that if Zidane didn't absolutely take control and win the final for his team by scoring goals, they generally lost it (apart from the Euro 00 final and even there he had better overall stats than both Henry and Totti, both of whom are considered to have had a better game than him by his detractors and were the respective motms for their teams). Which shows how the "he always played with superior teammates" argument is also a bit of a fallacy (at least for cup finals).

In any case, if you hold say Xavi to that same scale, for instance, and give him the same handicap with regards to his teammates, he would have a lot lesser volume of major trophies to show for all his brilliant play, considering that he never scored in any major final. Point is, that you have to understand that Zidane was a midfielder, and so scoring was not always possible for him. And if his teammates also did not score from the chances he provided for them, it was hardly his fault. He was definitely not "invisible" in all those games you listed, as for instance I pointed out in case of Euro 00, or as is the case for the 97 CL final wherein he hit the post and also had a pre-assist. Thus there are some clear hyperboles in that above mentioned list almost like saying Xavi was invisible for the WC 2010 final.

For your reference, below is a list of big game goals by Zidane -

Stage Tournament Year Goals
Final European Cup 2002 1
Semi Final European Cup 2003 1
Semi Final European Cup 2002 1
Semi Final European Cup 1998 1
Semi Final European Cup 1997 1
Semi Final Euro 2000 1
Final World Cup 2006 1
Final World Cup 1998 2
Semi Final World Cup 2006 1

Source - http://www.averageopposition.com/201...-findings.html , which is a blog that has a compilation of players' goals scored in major international tournament finals and semi finals and awards points accordingly to said players (Zidane is 5th in that list btw).

In addition to the above, below is a list of his indirect goal involvements in big games drawn as per the same criteria as above,
So, if you consider direct assists as per the big games that the blog is counting, he has,
1 vs Slavia Prague in the SF in E3 1996
2 vs Ajax in E1 in the SF in E1 1997
1 vs Manchester United in the SF in E1 1999
1 vs Barcelona in the SF in E1 2002

And, if you also consider pks won, pre-assists and setups, all leading to goals, he has,
1 setup vs Ajax in the SF in E1 1997
1 pre-assist vs Borussia Dortmund in the F in E1 1997
1 pk won vs Monaco in the SF in E1 1998
1 setup vs Croatia in the SF in WC 1998
1 pre-assist vs Manchester United in E1 1999

The above are from my own memory, so if you want to cross check, best to try and find the video highlights of the respective games.

In any case, the above together come to 20 goals he was a contributor to in 23 games in the Semis and Finals of the major international tournaments that he featured in. That's more than either Xavi or Iniesta and approximately close to what Messi's numbers look like, from what I recollect as having counted (cannot find the post right now), when looking at their goal involvement across a similar criteria of games.

Another little known fact: Zidane only ever gave 1 assist to Henry in their entire tenure with the France NT. And it was from a set piece. This is supposed to be the playmaker that defined a generation? No, I don't think so. He played his whole career as a bona fide #10, but he has a pitiable goal+assist/game ratio that doesn't even compare to modern #10s like James Rodríguez (ironically), De Bruyne, Fabregas and Ozil, let alone the true greats of yesteryear, like his contemporaries Nedved, Rivaldo, Del Piero, Ronaldo or Figo, who all put up far superior contributions to their teams in all of goals, assists, actual playmaking, be it from the center or from the wing. To put numbers to a single example, which I selected because of the similar amount of games:

Zidane
played 231 times in 5 seasons for Real Madrid, always as an AM
scored 49 goals, including 9 in the CL/Supercup
made 51 assists, including 10 in the CL/Supercup
played 108 times for France though his career, with 31 goals (including penalties) and 29 assists
Rivaldo
played 235 times in 5 seasons for Barcelona, as an LW (which he disliked) and as an AM
scored 130 goals, including 31 (THIRTY ONE) in the CL/Supercup
made 50 assists, including 6 in the CL/Supercup
played 79 times for Brazil, with 37 goals and 18 assists, not a penalty-taker

First of all, Zidane did not always play as an AM for RM. Especially during 03/04 and 04/05, he was mostly forced out wide (to the left), to accomodate Beckham in the center of midfield, since Figo would not relinquish his right midfield spot, even though he could play on the left side almost just as well. Rivaldo on the other hand played as a forward as well as an AM and sometimes a LW.

Secondly, he did not take all PKs and FKs for Real Madrid, or even most of them, unlike Rivaldo did for Barcelona. Figo took almost all of them, leaving a tiny amount for Zidane, thus drastically impacting his goal numbers as well as assist numbers. Also, Rivaldo did take pks for Brazil e.g., he took the regular time pks against Russia, Uruguay, Turkey and Peru (off the top of my head), so saying he was not a penalty taker for his country is quite the lie. In fact, I find it worrying that the pk point is mentioned for Zidane when he had all of 19 career PKs while it is not mentioned for Rivaldo who had 65 (both including PSOs).

Thirdly, the French NT unlike the Brazilian was not setup to score goals, but was primarily a defensive side. This hindered Zidane's goal and assist output at an NT level.

Considering the above handicaps, Zidane actually did quite well for himself in terms of the numbers he put up, especially at NT level.

Lastly, for the case with Henry, there are a few things that need to be considered,
1) Zidane did assist Henry during the Euro 00 as well, in addition to doing it in WC 06, though the first one was a goal more made by Henry dribbling than the pass from Zidane, which was routine
2) Apart from those assists though, there were a number of opportunities that Zidane provided to Henry which he couldn't capitalise on when playing for the French NT. Ten of these are listed here (although there are definitely more) - https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/cri...#post-31340027
3) Zidane's playmaking had a pronounced indirect effect on Henry's scoring, in that it enabled the same. This can be seen if we look at the matches played by Henry from his debut till his 85th cap (vs Italy in WC 06, when Zidane retired), and look at his gpg while playing with Zidane and without Zidane,

Games featuring both Henry & Zidane - Games 56* / Henry Goals 25 / Henry GPG 0.45
Games featuring Henry but not Zidane - Games 29 / Henry Goals 11 / Henry GPG 0.38

Considering the same numbers as above only for NT tournaments,

Games featuring both Henry & Zidane - Games 18/ Henry Goals 10/ Henry GPG 0.55
Games featuring Henry but not Zidane - Games 6 / Henry Goals 1 / Henry GPG 0.17

Sources -
http://www.rsssf.com/miscellaneous/henry-intlg.html
http://www.rsssf.com/miscellaneous/zidane-intl.html

So during the time that Zidane was active i.e. till Henry's 85th cap, Henry had a significantly better gpg with him in the team than without him there and this was even more pronounced when playing in NT tournaments.

Thus ultimately, in case of the Zidane-Henry partnership, Zidane definitely did do enough to get more assists for Henry and was also definitely a positive influence on Henry's goalscoring, especially in major NT tournaments.

Yet somehow, all this highlights-based revisionism twists Zidane into somehow a better, more productive, more efficient, more legendary player than Rivaldo - a player with EIGHTY goals more than Zidane in a similar time-frame, playing in the same position. The exact same evaluation can be made for Totti (a MUCH better playmaker than Zidane ever was, whose passing, goals/assists tally and capacity to run a game at his prime were like three whole levels above Zizou's), Figo (also a much better playmaker, whose record of La Liga assists wasn't broken until Messi), Del Piero and Nedved (both better for Juve than Zidane ever was), Rui Costa (who was better in Serie A than Zidane, particularly for Fiorentina) and many, many other great, even better players who were simply marginalized by Zidane's two WC goals in the 98 Final, which FIFA and UEFA saw as an opportunity to market and big-up Zidane as some sort of Europe's answer to Ronaldo - his post-WC poster-boyism, his natural skill and elegance in ball control and his later move to the original Galacticos Madrid lending credibility to this marketing campaign. His 1998 FIFA WPOTY and Ballon D'or were based simply on that one game, completely disregarding how he was invisible during the CL Final against Real Madrid in the same year or in all the other games of that very same World Cup. Of course, statistics are not the be-all end-all, but Zidane's lack of tactical nous, famous inconsistence (as great managers have said, "inconsistence" is just a lack of tactical knowledge and application. the best tacticians are always the most consistent players) and lack of awareness for the final pass put him just way too far behind other top #10s to disregard the gap between them.

The above, as far as I can tell, is a bit of a rant with,
1) Some really odd opinions, for instance, Totti's playmaking at his prime being 3 whole levels above Zidane, is something that I am not even sure is supposed to have any meaning, since it is impossible to calculate or measure in any way; or Del Piero and Nedved both being better for Juve than Zidane, though both together couldn't achieve as much at a continental level as Zidane did with just one of them, while having a similar domestic impact.
2) Or inane stat bashing, for instance Rivaldo/Figo are mentioned to have better goal tallies and assist tallies respectively. Well that's like saying that Iniesta is a poor player because during that same era, Ozil had a better assist tally and Rooney had a better goal tally. What I'm trying to point out is that Ozil takes almost all set-pieces for his teams, and does less playmaking and more final ball passing while Rooney plays as a forward just as often as he plays as a playmaker, unlike Iniesta, which helps these players improve their stats compared to Iniesta. Just like Figo and Rivaldo could do, when compared to Zidane. In big international games wherein their teams met though, like in the WC 98 or Euro 00, it was Zidane who came out on top with some top-drawer performances. And that makes the difference between era defining players and the rest.
3) And ultimately ending with the same inconsistency related Zidane bashing that I have addressed elsewhere in this post

Last but not least, the folks at Big Soccer have put together a very interesting compilation on Zidane's performances, trying to list all of his matches based on the ratings the press assigned to that week's game, with corresponding videos when available:
https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/zinedine-zidane-review-1996-2006.2006080 (highly recommended read)
Those who, unlike the older folks like me (30+), didn't see him week in, week out, this is a place as good as any to see how damned inconsistent, erratic and unspectacular he could be.

I was part of this rating exercise and first of all it was only done for 2 seasons i.e. 96/97 and 97/98. Furthermore, the "ratings" used are from a couple of Italian magazines which are unduly harsh on Zidane, especially when compared to how they rated homegrown talent like Del Piero.

For more non-partisan ratings, democratically compiled by getting voted upon, ESM is a good source. ESM stands for European Sports Media and it is a forum of media outlets wherein they vote for and come out with monthy teams for club football performances. This started from 95/96 onwards. Messi and CRonaldo who are generally considered to have been very consistent, lead the pack with the most appearances for the current era, as well as overall. Guess who leads for the era during the time that Zidane played? Well overall it is Carlos who is way ahead of the pack at 34, and behind him on 2nd it is indeed Zidane with 24 appearances, who is also the offensive player (more difficult to get on the list than defensive players, for whom consistency is more easy to display) with the highest number of appearances for that era. Here is the list of teams between 95/96 and 07/08 - http://www.rsssf.com/miscellaneous/esm-xi.html. The player totals should be at this link (2011) - https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/esm...month.1693535/

Furthermore, if we look at Zidane's teammates when he was playing for his strongest club teams, and compare their performances with his by looking at ESM appearances, it becomes obvious who was the most consistent out of the lot,

ESM Season XI, Zidane and Club Teammates' Comparison -

Juventus
96-97: Del Piero(3), Deschamps(3), Fererra(3), Zidane(2), Peruzzi(2), Boksic(1), Vieri(1), Di Livio(1)
97-98: Zidane(5), Peruzzi(3), Del Piero(2), Inzaghi(1)
98-99: None
99-00: Zidane(2), Montero(2), Davids(1), Van Der Sar(1)
00-01: Zidane(2), Inzaghi(1)

Real Madrid
01-02: Zidane(5), Carlos(4), Raul(2), Morientes(1), Hierro(1), Helguera(1), Casillas(1)
02-03: Carlos(4), Zidane(3), Ronaldo(2), Raul(2), Helguera(1)
03-04: Zidane(4), Ronaldo(3), Beckham(2), Carlos(2), Casillas(2), Salgado(1)
04-05: Ronaldo(1)
05-06: Robinho(1)

The above voted on monthly ratings thus seem to paint a different picture regarding Zidane's consistency, to the one painted by the ratings provided by a few individual publications that you have linked to above. IIRC, if you consider Xavi (a midfielder who was considered to be very consistent while also being considered to be quite brilliant) for this same metric, then at the time that he left for Qatar he had a similar number of ESM monthly appearances to Zidane's. Iniesta though has slightly lesser appearances till date, again IIRC.

Zidane was a great player, for sure, but to put him in top 5s or top 10s in the history of football just reeks of revisionism based on idolized yet sparse highlights. Implying a player as inconsistent, ineffective, with relatively low end product and devoid of tactical finesse as Zidane is anywhere close to being a Top 10 player of all time is a crime to the history of football. In reality, he's barely top 50, if that. Platini was legitimately better, he just didn't deliver a WC - just ask older France or Juventus fans.

Where one puts Zidane is as per their own preference IMO. One can always hold certain qualities above others when forming a list, and the list thus created would reflect that preference.

Zidane being barely top 50 is lol-worthy though, and simply shows how the opinion behind the entire post is probably not something to be taken seriously. After all, it takes a special kind of preference to alternative facts, to suggest that a player who was man of the match in both World Cup and Champions League finals, has won best player of the season awards in three separate leagues, player of the tournament awards for 2 separate international NT tournaments and 1 international club tournament, won the overall player of the year awards on 4 separate years from 3 separate publications, made all time Euro and World Cup teams, won player of the decade from two separate publications and made the all time best XIs for two other publications, is barely top-50. I would dearly like to see a list of 50 players who are more widely decorated, individually. I understand individual awards are out of fashion since Messi and CRonaldo started winning all of them, but the sheer breadth of awards that Zidane has won (even if he might not have the volume), shows peers and observers acknowledging him across a very wide range of tournaments, seasons. and eras. Quite the feat for a barely top-50 player.

 

Switchkick55..superb analysis..
Zidane would always be one of the greatest ever..he ticks so many boxes to be considered one of greatest ever

 

ok. if you want to make that statement then that is ok. everyone has different criteria for rankings. and i think the point you make is valid. however, because of the sheer dominance of world cups that players like maradona, garrincha, eusebio, etc. had, i would put these players over zidane.
but there is nothing wrong with that. it`s just a difference of opinions. just as i put Ronaldinho above Cr7, i can still respect and agree with the fact that Cr7 has an all time better ranking because he has been good over a much longer number of years.
no reason to keep going on this topic because something like this will never be mutually agreed upon.

ok. let`s take away the world cups from both pele and zico and only compare them at club level.
1) as a player, i rate pele in a class above zico, judging from both of their overall games.
2) i stated earlier that it is very common for the majority of people to question how brazilians fare against European teams even in pele`s time. pele played a large number of the best european teams throughout his career and recorded a very good goal tally and a majority number of wins. i don`t think zico played nearly the amount of the best european teams so many times while playing for flamengo. for this reason, i believe that this also hurts his reputation as an all time great.
3) it is obvious that zico not winning a world cup would not put him in as a good a light as if he had won it. as is the case for any player. had zico won the world cup, i still would not hold him in the same level as pele. for me anyways, winning or not winning a world cup does not decide how great of a player you are. i do my best to judge players on their level of performances and not the amount of trophies or which trophies his team won alone.
4) will you ever forgive me for misspelling `Flamengo`as `Flamingo`???? thank you for your wise words of wisdom and educating me on the difference between the 2 words. i am forever indebted to you. of course, such a mistake would be obvious to call out considering that only a genius as yourself could determine what i actually meant behind such a misspelling.

ok. it was a mistake to compare the 2 in anyway. my bad.

ok, so, let me clarify this one thing. any time that i actually watch a game, statisitcs are irrelevant to me in many aspects. not all aspects but many aspects. in the same way, that Cr7 has the most assist in CL history can mislead someone to think that Cr7 is actually even mentionable as one of the best passers in CL history, is the same way that statistics can largely misrepresent something. the type of assist that Cr7 gets largely contain of 5 yd side way passes or back passes that he is not capable of scoring. but of course, if you watch the greatest players in CL or european champions cup history, you would not put Cr7 in the top 5 or even 10 passers, unless of course you went off of statistics alone.
on the other hand, if you do want to compare the WC78 of Kempes and the WC98 of Zidane, i would be happy to start a thread so that the whole forum can take the vote and make their cases as to which had the better performance, and i will be sure to include the statistics that you mentioned.

of course, looking at this statement alone can be thrown out of context which the media has perfected. when i said this understand that i said this to let you understand that zidane never had to play alongside a player like messi. for this reason, it would be easier to look like a big player when you are playing alongside `del piero`or `raul`, compared to players like xavi and iniesta who played alongside arguably the greatest player of all time!

this is actually a legitimate statement if we are considering league play. barcelona has dominated la liga for a while, especially when iniesta and xavi were at their peaks. but let`s not forget that they were playing against a madrid team (10-14) that could probably have easily won the serie A a number of times in the 90s (but you could think otherwise which is fair).
however, the CL had just as much parity as when zidane played. barcelona was no more at an advantage than juventus in terms of champions league difficulty and @leadleader explained this when you look at the teams that went to the finals during the 90s to early 2000s if i`m not mistaken. and xavi and iniesta displayed top performances in the CL, especially in big final matches such as the ones against top Manchester United teams in 09 and 11. iniesta also played well in 2015 against Juventus (a team that was on the verge of winning a treble).

 

@SwitchKick55
what a long analysis! nice! good to see you joined the forum. i would love to read your post but unfortunately, i don`t have time at the moment. would love to read it later, whether i disagree or not.

 

The above makes absolutely no sense, and summarizes just how out of your depth you really are about Zidane himself, and even more so about the modern era that you know literally close to nothing about. This is the reality: the greats of Zidane's generation had not been great for a long, long, long time before Xavi-Iniesta ever got to play their starring roles.

Brazil's Ronaldo had not been great since 2003. Zidane had not been great since 2002. Figo had not been great since 2001. Nedved had not been great since 2003. Rivaldo had not been great since 1999. Totti had not been great since 2005 (and he never fully recovered after the serious injury that limited his role at World Cup 2006). Riquelme's European adventure was over in 2006. Ronaldinho's prime was over in 2006. The reason why Xavi-Iniesta supposedly benefited, was not because it was an era of less overall talent, but because of the same exact thing that happens with every era -- the old talent fades out, and the new talent ALWAYS needs a few transitional seasons before they hit their full stride. It happened with Zidane's generation, and guess what, it has happened with every single generation that has ever played the game.

The period of 2007-2012 is an era with prime Cristiano Ronaldo, an emerging Messi who produced 2 GOAT seasons in those years, an emerging Kaka who was cut down early in his career by injury, an emerging Arjen Robben who achieved the greatest peak by a Dutch footballer since Marco Van Basten, the peak and prime of the great and possibly underrated Zlatan Ibrahimovic, the midfield dominance of Xaxi Hernandez, the midfield wizardry of Andres Iniesta, some of Steven Gerrard's best seasons were played in those years -- how could an educated person ever believe that Xavi and Iniesta 'benefited' from a so-called weak era?? Xavi and Iniesta actually were in fact unlucky to have played in the same era as prime Cristiano Ronaldo and prime Messi. The argument that Xavi and Iniesta benefited because Zidane's generation retired, is thoroughly laughable.

 

When Cantona and Deschamps played together within the French team, France did not play with a number 10 like Zidane who had quite a central position at midfield. In 1991-92, the "number 10" was Pérez who was more a side attacking midfielder/ false winger while in the years just before and just after '92 France played without any number 10. Or it was, in some maneer, Cantona, but as a free-electron of the forefront.

In in his early career at Nantes, Deschamps was a box-to-box (was at every corner of the field). He did not score much goals, but he has scored almost all his NT goals at this moment, circa '89 (like a long-range shot against Scotland from memory and also another one in the same style). He still had a quite powerful shooting of the ball, which has completely disappeared of his register quite early. Deschamps specialized more as a man-marker at midfield during his first stint at OM (1989-90): not a success as he was not accostumed to such a restricted role that demanded him to follow the best opponent player (the 10) everywhere (and as he had to adapt to the very peculiar context of Marseille at the same time). So he was loaned to Bordeaux (1990). Here and during his second stint at OM (succesful this one), he was not a box-to-box anymore but the kind of defensive midifleder which is still quite complete. Same with the French time where he played behind Cantona, with no real number 10 between them two.

Is that Cantona called Deschamps "his water-carrier" in the specific context, recently, of the non-selection of Karim Benzema as to say that Deschamps did not like the talented player for his team. And to ciriticize at the same time the lack of ambition at an offensive point of view of the NT coach (which is Deschamps). Also, again, he exactly called Deschamps his "water-carrier" (so it is well about the time at which they played together), so in a pejorative and a despising way to say the least. Is that Cantona identifies himself with Benzema as a misunderstood genius. Cantona was not really making a tactical analysis on Deschamps as a player, it was a personal attack, a maneer to insult him. Clearly.

To which Deschamps answered "the water-carrier'' made him scored such a good number of goals though'' (...amongst other things more about the heart of the matter). Which is exact. 3 goals of Cantona with the French team comes from assists by Deschamps. Not the most talented player ever seen for sure, we tend to forget of Deschamps that he was an excellent passer though. In the context of the French team 91-93, it was often crosses from the side of the midfield. At Juve, more from an axial position.

At last, but it's less funny, Cantona claimed that if Benzema was not selected, it was because the NT coach was a racist. Deschamps brang this to court. Just after the says of Cantona, the personal house of Deschamps and of his family has been tagged (and he has probably received some menaces). Deschamps should win this case in all likelihood. He is not a racist.
Cantona has here repeated what...Benzema himself said first.

 

I have many reasons to be convinced about my opinion, that there is no rational defense of Zidane's historical position... I am an admirer of players like Zidane/Riquelme, and yet it's very easy for me to understand why the vast majority of the pro-Zidane arguments are (honestly) laughable at best. In fact, I honestly have never actually read any convincing pro-Zidane argument. In fact, over 95% of the pro-Zidane arguments that I have read over the years, are intellectually dishonest arguments that have no relation to the actual facts and/or the actual proper context of the relevant time.

It's actually relatively easy to debunk the pro-Zidane propaganda. It basically comes down to HONESTY... If you are honest with your analysis, your conclusion will always be that Zidane is obviously overrated to some debatable degree. Of course, it is because pro-Zidane arguments are so dishonest in so many different ways, that it is time-consuming to comprehensively debunk all the intellectual dishonest actively at play.

The above 'data' is completely divorced from reality, and in very very laughable ways at that.

1. In the 1996-97 Champions League, Juventus had an 'easy ride' to the Final, where Borussia Dortmund kept Zidane quiet, and where Dortmund also won the Final.

Ajax 1994/95 won the league (106 goals scored; 28 goals against).
Ajax 1994/95 won the UCL (16 goals scored; 4 goal against).


Ajax 1995/96 won the league (97 goals scored; 24 goals against).
Ajax 1995/96 was 2nd place at the UCL (22 goals scored; 2 goals against).


Ajax 1996/97 was 4th place in the league (55 goals scored; 31 goals against).
Ajax 1996/97 was humiliated in the Semi Finals of the UCL (14 goals scored; 13 goals against).

Ajax 1996-97 was the most difficult team that Zidane played in the KO stage of the 1996-97 UCL campaign, and as the data above demonstrates; Ajax 1996-97 was 4th place in the Dutch league, and conceded 13 goals in the Champions League... Put differently: Ajax 1996-97 conceded 13 goals, compared to Ajax 1995-96 which conceded 2 conceded goals in the previous Champions League (in as many games as Ajax 1996-97). Juventus without Zidane, was good enough to win the UCL Final vs. Ajax 1995-96, i.e., a club with a proven pedigree (had won the previous UCL Final), with a great defensive record, and also the number one club in their league. On the other hand, Ajax 1996-97 was the 4th place club in the 4th or the 5th best league in the world at the time. And Juventus 1996-97 was one of the Top 2 clubs, in the best league in the world at the time.

If Juventus (without Zidane) could win the UCL Final against a proven Ajax team... What exactly did Zidane 'demonstrated' when he played against relatively weak clubs such as Rosenborg 1996-97 (Quarter Finals), and Ajax 1996-97 (Semi Finals)?? There was no Round of 16, because only 2 clubs per country could play the Champions League, which not coincidentally is a significant part of the reason why Zidane was getting weak opponents in the Quarter Finals and the Semi Finals - because only 2 clubs per country could play the Champions League... So the best league in the world at the time, the Serie A, had 2 clubs, and Zidane played for one of those 2 clubs, i.e., Zidane could only possibly play just one or two games against another Serie A club in the Champions League. Only 2 clubs from the Spanish La Liga. Only 2 clubs from the English Premier League. In other words: there were not enough teams to have a Round of 16 stage, and there were a bunch of 'relatively weak clubs' like Ajax 1996-97, Rosenborg 1996-97, Auxerre 1996-97, Steaua Bucarest 1996-97, etc., in the later stages of the competition (because the top leagues only had 2 clubs playing in the UCL).

Juventus with Pavel Nedved would have definitely qualified to the 1996-97 UCL Final, simply because Juventus without Nedved and also without Zidane, literally won the 1996 UCL Final against a strong Ajax team. So what exactly is the argument that would justify that Juventus without Zidane and also without Nedved, was in fact good enough to win the 1996 UCL Final against a strong Ajax... But that Juventus with Nedved (but without Zidane) would somehow not be good enough to win the 1997 UCL Semi Finals against a 4th place Ajax (with a bad defensive record in the UCL)??

The argument that, "Nedved reached only one UCL final vs the two reached during Zidane's time..." That argument is laughable, because it implies that Zidane was somehow instrumental when Juventus enjoyed an easy run against weak Ajax 1996-97 (Semi Finals) and against weak Rosenborg 1996-97 (Quarter Finals). The known fact that Juventus 1995-96 (without Zidane) literally won the 1996 UCL Final against a good Ajax team, should thoroughly and conclusive debunk this propaganda where Zidane is shamelessly deified because he could play well against teams that Juventus could easily beat with or without Zidane. The fact of the matter is that Juventus was always going to play the Champions League Final 1997. It has nothing to do with Zidane playing for Juventus. It was a guaranteed fact, because Juventus (with or without Zidane) was always going to beat thoroughly inferior opponents like Ajax 1996-97 or Rosenborg 1996-97. Put differently: Zidane 'reached' two UCL Finals because Juventus was benefitting from a weak Champions League KO stage (i.e., only 2 clubs per top league). Nedved did not 'reached' two UCL Finals, because when Nedved played for Juventus, you had double the amount of top clubs in the Champions League (i.e., 4 clubs per top league). Not only did Nedved played against better opponents on average, but Nedved also offered a demonstrable statistical improvement over any single one of Zidane's Champions League campaigns with the Juventus colors.

And also to be noted: Nedved's statistical improvement was already noticeable in the 2001-02 Champions League, where Thuram's and Buffon's defensive impact had no statistical impact, i.e., the Juventus defense had the same exact defensive record in 2000-01 and 2001-02.

Juventus 2001-02 / 12 goals against / 13 goals scored / out of 6 games.
Juventus 2001-02 / 16 goals against / 18 goals scored / out of 12 games.

Juventus 2001-02 without Nedved, scored 5 goals in 6 games. Juventus 2001-02 with Nedved, scored 13 goals in 6 games. Nedved more-than-doubled the creative output of Juventus. It is in the defensive end, that Thuram and Buffon failed to offer the statistical improvement that should be expected from them.

Real Madrid 2001-02 / 10 goals against / 27 goals scored / out of 12 games.
Juventus 2001-02 / 16 goals against / 18 goals scored / out of 12 games.
Deportivo 2001-02 / 14 goals against / 17 goals scored / out of 12 games.
Roma 2001-02 / 10 goals against / 12 goals scored / out of 12 games.
Barcelona 2001-02 / 12 goals against / 19 goals scored / out of 12 games.
Lazio 2001-02 / 7 goals against / 4 goals scored / out of 6 games.
Mallorca 2001-02 / 9 goals against / 4 goals scored / out of 6 games.
(AC Milan 2001-02 UEFA Cup / 8 goals against / 18 goals / out of 12 games.)

Juventus attacked well enough, scored 18 goals, the 3rd highest amount behind Barcelona (19 goals) and Real Madrid (27 goals). Juventus also was the highest scoring Italian team, ahead of any other Italian team in the Champions League. In fact, Juventus scored as many goals as AC Milan scored at the easier UEFA Cup. Nedved being the playmaker appears to have done well enough in his very first season with Juventus, considering the fact that he won the Serie A, and he also more-than-doubled Juventus' creative output in the Champions League. On the other hand, Juventus conceded 16 goals in 12 games - Thuram and Buffon clearly didn't offered meaningful improvements in terms of what the defensive statistics measure.

Juventus 2002-03 / 19 goals against / 30 goals scored / out of 16 games.
Real Madrid 2002-03 / 19 goals against / 33 goals scored / out of 16 games.
AC Milan 2002-03 / 14 goals against / 21 goals scored / out of 16 games.
Valencia 2002-03 / 12 goals against / 24 goals scored / out of 14 games.
Inter 2002-03 / 19 goals against / 26 goals scored / out of 16 games.
Barcelona 2002-03 / 9 goals against / 27 goals scored / out of 14 games.
Roma 2002-03 / 12 goals against / 10 goals scored / out of 12 games.

The top clubs from Italy and the top clubs from Spain, appear to have nearly identical defensive records. Nesta, Thuram, Maldini, Buffon - do not demonstrate any defensive superiority at the Champions League. There is no reason to believe that Zidane with Thuram-Buffon, would have enjoyed some amazing defensive coverage... There is nothing statistical, and nothing video-based, to suggest that Zidane would've benefitted a great deal from having Thuram-Buffon in the team. More of the good old 'semantics' that are systematically used to inflate Zidane's value as a player.

The above 'semantics game' is the typical pro-Zidane intellectual dishonesty... The entire pro-Zidane propaganda, entirely depends on pure semantics. So the very first thing that a pro-Zidane propagandist will try to do, is to win the argument over the semantics, with the premeditated motive of creating the illusion that semantics are objective within the context of this argument. In this context: semantics cannot be objective, and for a very simple reason -- the video itself demonstrably and conclusively refutes over 80% of everything that is attributed to so-called 'classic 10' players.

A classic 10 never 'controlled the tempo' of the game. Pro-Zidane propagandists insist on that claim about 'dictating the tempo' of the game, but no classic 10 in the history of the game ever dictated the tempo of his team. This fact can be easily demonstrated with hours upon hours of video evidence. Maradona, Platini, and Zico, are the quintessential 'classic 10' of the 1980s. Maradona, Platini, and Zico, never dictated the tempo of the game. Zidane also never dictated the tempo of the game in any consistent-objective sense. The so-called 'classic tens' never dictated the tempo of the game in any consistent-objective sense. This is a demonstrable fact based in video evidence (instead of loosely based on science fiction semantics).

The entire premise that 'classic tens' dictated the tempo, is in fact a grand delusion, perpetrated by nostalgic fanatics who have created their delusion on the basis of establishing science fiction semantics, that they then pass off as objective 'common knowledge'. There's no truth behind any of those narratives. The truth is actually rather simple: Maradona, Platini, Zico, were the Messis of their own time. Back then, the sport was slow enough and malicious enough, that playing like Maradona/Zico was the closest you could get to playing like Messi. You couldn't run like Messi, because yellow cards were not used consistently, which meant that the use of brutal fouls was 'normal', which meant that a player like Messi would get hacked to pieces, and his career would go downhill very quickly (after one or two serious injuries). Furthermore, defensive players did not attacked like in the modern game, which also meant that Messi-like runs were nowhere near as efficient, because the team did not attacked with 4-5 players like it does today.

And most importantly, the defensive system was not 'zonal defense', it was a 'keep a close eye on Maradona' defensive system; hence why nobody could run like Messi, because brutal fouls were a normal aspect of the game. In the late 1980s and the early 1990s, zonal defense had not yet taken over completely (in fact, zonal defense still had a long way to go before it became truly 'zonal' in its actual function), and a lot of the old 'keep a close eye on their number ten' defensive mindset was still deeply embedded in the defensive systems of all teams. So the team defended with less players (than is the case today), but those fewer players were condensed/organized around Maradona/Zico, maliciously applying a the defensive strategy of 'soft jabs' on the ankles of Maradona/Zico, and after enough of those 'soft jabs' the players had swollen ankles to a degree that simply has not been the norm ever since the late 1990s. That malicious dimension of the defensive sport of the late 1980s and early 1990s, was arguably largely cleaned out before the 1990s were over.

The reason why 'classic tens' have purportedly gone extinct, is very simple... The sport is too fast for classic tens, and therefore classic tens have been pushed into more 'forward' roles (like Messi or Hazard) and/or into more defensive roles (like Andrea Pirlo or Xavi Hernandez). In other words: classic tens are in fact still around today -- in fact Messi is a classic ten in the real sense of the term -- but classic tens are forced into playing in different areas of the pitch, because of the speed of the modern game. Remember: in the modern game, the team attacks with 4-5 players, and the team defends with 6-7 players. A mistake by a 'classic ten' gets severely punished by the unforgiving counter-attacks of the modern game. This is why classic tens have been pushed into more 'forward positions', so that if a classic ten makes a mistake, the defense has enough space/time to recover from said classic-ten-mistake. Similarly, the deep-lying playmakers like Pirlo, don't attack as much, but defend much more than a so-called 'classic ten', with the aim of minimizing the danger of the modern counter-attack. Put differently: classic tens never became 'extinct', instead, classic tens were pushed into more forward roles and/or more defensive roles, as a result of the increasing speed of the sport itself.

More of the typical pro-Zidane intellectual dishonesty...

1. Being 'tactically limited' and playing a 'tactically important' role, are entirely different arguments. Moreover, determining what the 'tactical limit' is, is a relatively highly complex task. Why did Zidane always played in almost identical fashion, when he played well?? And why did Zidane also played in almost identical fashion, when he didn't played well?? Zidane never really looked like a 'tactician' who adjusted in-game, and who, most importantly, adjusted his game accurately. He seemed to play the same identical style, and sometimes it worked, and sometimes it didn't worked. That hardly makes him a master tactician.

2. Michael Laudrup had a falling out with Johan Cruyff, and that was the first and the biggest reason why Laudrup was 'dropped' for the 1994 Champions League Final. The other reason was the fact that Barcelona could only play 3 foreigners at a time, which meant that Romario and Stoichkov were regulars, and Koeman and Laudrup rotated - the falling out between Laudrup and Cruyff obviously tilted the balance in favor of Koeman, Stoichkov, and Romario, with Laudrup being the one who was more often kept out of the important games. And which conclusively explains why Michael Laudrup was playing for Real Madrid the following season.

Not to mention, that the 1994 UCL Final was a game where Barcelona was destroyed in humiliating fashion, a 4-0 disastrous defeat, arguably because Cruyff's ego played against Barcelona's interests. And what happened to the great Barcelona 'Dream Team' when Michael Laudrup stopped playing for Barcelona?? Barcelona's Dream Team more or less disintegrated very quickly, in the space of one single season, which not coincidentally was the same season that Michael Laudrup won his fifth consecutive La Liga title (this time playing for Real Madrid). Romario was out of there, as soon as the cracks started to appear. Not even the great Gheorghe Hagi, after his impressive display at World Cup 1994, was enough to compensate for the heart and soul of Barcelona's Dream Team, who always had been Michael Laudrup. The fact of the matter is: Barcelona rarely ever looked like a so-called 'Dream Team' when Laudrup wasn't playing. (Which is perhaps a testament to how underrated Michael Laudrup was at the time.)

To argue that Laudrup's absence at the Champions League Final 1994, is somehow an argument that for some convoluted reason proves how 'tactically adept' Zidane is... Is another one of those microcosms that comprehensively demonstrate just how intellectually dishonest the pro-Zidane propaganda is, that they are willing to use a 'falling out' between Laudrup and Cruyff, as proof of how Laudrup was inferior to the superior Zidane. These are the facts: Laudrup played 1 UCL Final, and won it; Zidane played 3 UCL Finals, and only won 1 out of 3. For some reason, winning 1 out of 3 Finals, and at the same time being below-average in 2 out of 3 Finals (not coincidentally the 2 Finals that Zidane did not win), is unbelievably enough the argument that demonstrates how Zidane was somehow superior to Laudrup. Does any of it makes sense?? Absolutely not. (And that's not even taking into account, the fact that Barcelona could only play 3 foreigners at any given time, which forced one out of Koeman or Laudrup into sitting it out... A situation that Zinedine Zidane never experienced in his career.)

The pro-Zidane argument is, as usual, just a semantics game where an irreparable falling out between Laudrup and Cruyff gets manipulated into an argument of how, "Zidane would've never been dropped in such an important game..." Except of course, a Top 5 all timer with the strong convictions of Johan Cruyff, would absolutely have the courage to flat out 'drop' Zinedine Zidane. And of course, the reasons behind denying Zidane could possibly be wrong (it's difficult to say seeing how all of this is pure science fiction), but if Zidane and Cruyff had an irreversible falling out, Cruyff could easily deny Zidane the chance to play a Champions League Final... Which becomes even more of a realistic possibility when Cruyff can only play 3 foreigners at any given time.

Why are these 'common misconceptions' propagated by 'stat obsessed' revisionists??

I am not a stat obsessed person at all, and the more I look at Zidane's actual games, the more overrated Zidane looks. And I actually have one of the most comprehensive video collections of Zidane in the world, i.e., my argument is not about the stats, but about Zidane's actual performance level -- Zidane was clearly overrated in my unbiased video-based opinion.

As is usual with pro-Zidane arguments, the 'Zidane haters' are always primarily mischaracterized as 'stat obsessed nazis' who cannot appreciate the efficiency in Zidane's game - a thoroughly subjective ad hominem propaganda piece that systematically (with premeditated design) attacks the character of the person behind the argument, instead of objectively refuting the actual argument. When the propaganda piece starts with that statement, you cannot reasonably expect any form of reasonable/balanced analysis from that openly biased source.

Person Z says that he was part of a rating exercise?? Is Person X's opinion automatically more valid because he claims that he was part of some not-detailed ratings exercise??

Person Z thinks that Italian magazines are unduly harsh on Zidane?? Does Person Z have objective evidence via which to substantiate his subjective opinion of Italian magazines??

Person Z essentially thinks that there is some 'obscure conspiracy' against Zidane... (Apparently, Italian magazines hated Zidane for some reason...) But does Person Z offers any facts and/or evidence to consistently substantiate any of his claims?? Absolutely not... Because Person Z is obviously lying though his teeth. Person Z does not have any consistent facts, which is why he must limit his argument to manipulative science fiction semantics, misrepresented pseudo-statistics, and unwarranted 'character assassination' of the fans who actually analyze the facts about Zidane's inflated legacy. It's always difficult to debate against lying propagandists, because lying is very easy to do; off the top of my head I could come up with several essays explaining -- in what appears to be correct and detailed analysis -- how Zidane actually was the best player of all time... On the other hand, proper documentation and fact-checking of the events and the proper context as it was before the pro-Zidane revisionism, requires weeks of hard work, and perhaps worst of all, will always be ignored (no matter how good the argument is) by the majority of the fans who don't care about the boring truth.

 

Not my analysis, just came upon it on reddit

 

The anti zidane argument by lead leader just shows how hard it is to discredit zidane's achievement. He had to bring in so many points to assume so many things would happen/ not happen by imagining and twisting the facts. If this was the case, we can twist hundred facts to show every great players failed in some scenario..even maradona or pele

The fact remains zidane did enough to be considered one of the all time greats. It was not 1 or 2 things that he did that pushed him to greatness.

To name a few:
1) won many major tournaments
2) have great ability and skills
3) able to dominate major tournment (euro 2000)
4) scores great goals in major tournament
5) can play the beautiful game at highest level

Just a few points..i can list so many more

Understandable if someone like cantona is hyped up to be one of greatest..did some great things but not at ronaldo/ zidane/ iniesta level..we can argue if players like cantona is overhyped..but players like zidane ticks so many boxes to be considered great, and deservedly so

 

I think a lot of people try and focus on Zidane's failures to suggest that he was not so great. I see it the other way around i.e. if he had actually won the 96 UEFA Cup with Bordeaux, the 97 and 98 Champions League trophies with Juventus, the 99/00 and 00/01 Serie A titles that went down to the final day, the Copa del Rey titles in 2002 and 2004, the La Liga in 2004 for which Real Madrid had a 9 point lead in February and the 2006 World Cup with France; while having a couple more standout moments made possible through a bit more help from his teammates over these 7 or 8 games, then he would have a trophy cabinet rivaling that of the best players ever, while playing in an era with a lot of parity between teams. So would these same people then say that he was the greatest ever? I doubt it, since their reason for not preferring him is far more emotional than logical.

Ultimately, I think the whole thing boils down to the eye-test alongside one's personal preference. It is how scouts know that a kid is going to be the next Pele/Maradona/Platini and it is how fans of the game get attached to certain players i.e. those that tick the most boxes for those fans. For example, if a person has an innate attachment to forwards who have pace, power and superb technique with a formidable dribbling ability to regularly smash open defences, that person would tend to become a fan of a player like Ronaldo Nazario. Zidane similarly would have a following of those fans who prefer elegant midfield playmakers with impeccable technique who can use that technique to make a brilliant move from time to time, to score or provide an assist themselves.

Of course, the teams that these players join and are successful with, have fans of their own who can get attached to such a player rather quickly if said player ticks all their boxes. Conversely, that team obviously has rivals and fans of those rival teams, even if innately inclined to like said player, cannot bring themselves to accept that player due to the nature of sports rivalries. This leads to them working to actively try and downplay said player's abilities and achievements, especially if they have insecurities regarding similar players on their own team being unable to match said player's abilities and achievements. Such threads are an outcome of these efforts.

 

Ok, since you suggested its best not to continue, I will stop here.

The flamingo-Flamengo bit was a surprise for me, but more of the funny kind. On second thought, I should have added a smiley to make it obvious that it was tongue-in-cheek.

Regarding the rest, I did mention "slightly more lethal" in Pele's case. Guess I should have stressed it more. I think Zico lacked in the sheer physical aspect as compared to Pele, who was an exceptional specimen, and this aspect more than anything else made the latter more lethal.

No problem.

Considering this current thread is 93 pages and going, I doubt a forum vote would help our case about Kempes vs Zidane.

Anyway, I was more interested in your claim of Zidane not being close to reaching the level that Kempes displayed in taking over games in 1978, in any NT tournament. That was a strange thing to say for someone who insists that he doesn't go by stats IMO, since apart from goals and assist stats which were bumped up by Kempes operating as a forward/striker in comparison to Zidane, Kempes seemed to have a lot less involvement in the build-up play than Zidane.

Xavi never played with a peak Messi between 1998 and 2008. His first Balon d'Or ranking appearance was only in 2008 though. So how is your above point relevant to Xavi's lack of recognition prior to 2008?

In short, there were two paragraphs and one sentence which were together part of my response and you skipped the paragraph with the main evidence backing my point, while responding to the sentence and the other paragraph.

Having just one or two at-par rivals at a national and continental level helps, since then only a small aligning of stars - like the rivals being taken out by another team (Real Madrid being beaten by Juventus in CL 14/15 SFs) or injuries/infighting affecting them (Real Madrid implosion in 12/13, Bayern Munich injury issues in CL 14/15), can help the other party immensely. Btw, prior to Modric's arrival, Real Madrid didn't really have a single midfielder that could counter Barcelona's midfield, and relied more on hit-and-run tactics. So the timeline you mention above of Barcelona playing against a strong Real Madrid team, actually starts in summer 2013.