The London British based paper produced a poll of the top 9 greatest players of all-time in order: Source: El Gráfico
Some observations that pop out is how Puskas wasn’t considered at the time the best Hungarian of all-time as time later revealed. Understandably Di Stéfano was ranked as the best Argentinian since he was available by Europeans to witness. Also another popular vote for the top 10 British players of all-time was introduced.
Is there different criteria for the world vote (maybe 'top geniuses'?) and British player vote (maybe 'greatest players'?)? Because Alex James tops the world list and is 6th for Britain only! I also wonder whether longevity is considered strongly (or 'completed career' for the genius accolade still?). Or it could be a case of older established writers preferring older established players (and Finney for example not yet appreciated to the maximum? - but not being there while Alf Ramsey is, plus two much lesser known names, in the British list, is kind of a shock).
No, it’s just that there were two different separate polls, both published by the British paper. At the time it seems Puskas is viewed as the premier player in Europe or the greatest genius in the world by some, but is not considered the greatest Hungarian of all-time. Interestingly some Europeans have been omitted, like Giuseppe Meazza, Sindelar, Braine or Samitier.
Pretty cool to see Eddie Hapgood rated so highly I've been learning more and more about the Arsenal contingent of the 1930s. Some people have rated Alex James and Ted Drake very highly back then. The players who have fascinated me most are Eddie Hapgood (he'd be the equivalent of a CB today, yes?) and Cliff Bastin.
More like a defensive left-back I think, since Arsenal were using WM: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Chapman#Arsenal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddie_Hapgood
Which is pretty crazy to me. In my modernistic mind, the defensive fullback is easily the least talented role in all of football. yet it was rated so highly back in the 50s.
Yeah, I guess in those days it could have been seen as a bit more of a key role, with the duties of covering inside still, as well as marking the winger (and the wingers could certainly be highly rated back then, whether the mainly provider type like Matthews or the goalscoring type like Bastin); and if players like Hapgood were good athletically and decent on the ball I guess they did get involved in the build-ups down the wings at least. Whoever was voting in those polls clearly rated and valued the Arsenal players/team of the Chapman era highly anyway.
Obviously, the fullbacks of yesteryears weren't the wingbacks of today. In fact, even the Carlos Alberto and Nilton Santos and Ruud Krol of this world didn't really impress me with their offensive prowess compared to today's standards. They had ball skills, but they didn't push forward as much as one would associate with the tag "wingback". They looked more like a Denis Irwin or an oldie Philip Lahm to me. I thought Facchetti was the oldest wingback I know of as he actually pushed forward quite relentlessly, at least in the games I watched. I wonder if back in the pre-war era, the fullback while tasked with containing the opponents best players (wingers) were they also given some playmaking role?
The wing-half players of pre-WM times probably were, at least some like Jose Leandro Andrade who is high up on the world poll Vegan showed. They bore more resemblance to today's full-backs than the full-backs in their teams I think (Nasazzi being a full-back - playing fully back basically!). In WM the full-backs were positioned wider, but I guess didn't attack a lot near the opposition box, but Hapgood and others might have been exceptions to an extent.
Just to notice that Hapgood had two periods in his career: a) Playing as a Pyramid Fullback - close to modern CB, until early 1930s a) Playing as a WM Fullback - close to modern SB, since mid 1930s I guess, his peak was in the second part of his career. Of course, Arsenal was trying to play WM system many years before the mid 1930s.
Fantastic find! The list is really contrary to how players are ranked now with the top 3 pre-WW2 being James, Orth and Jose Andrade, while Meazza and Sindelar are nowhere to be seen. The original source might offer an explanation.
Do you remember which issue this was in exactly? Would help to find the original "World Sport" source