Krokko, You have undoubtedly an educated opinion but here some food for thought. I admit that the label 'total football' was applied to a number of teams and countries, like most fancied terms. Including Germany and even Italy, Spain and England. The Soviet Union too, which made sense because their distinguished club teams indeed shared core characteristics and developed the same ideas independently of the 'Western forces'. But somehow, while they receive today still praise for what they did in the 60s and 70s, they are rarely put under that label anymore. Just something to think about. Secondly, I've seen you criticizing the British game or more specifically the "British brand of football". I happen to see classic games too. Independent of the question to what extent generalizing statements are justified, I've seen a number of games where the (native) commentator makes analogies/comparisons between the 'British game' and 'German game.' That is just my (own) perception. In all fairness, I think I'm not the only one who sees those similarities even though generalizing statements for such enormous countries are hugely problematic. Specific example relating to this thread: when Messi pulled his team through against Milan a number of pundits (ranging from Sacchi to Cruijff) said that his team-mates worked hard, worked well, which granted Messi that extra yard of space to use. It is clear that Messi doesn't cease to be the best when that yard doesn't exist but how is he supposed to stand out, as a finisher, when his team-mates can't work to a sufficient level to provide him that space? To state it clear: I also don't say the opposite of your statement, that it is harder to stand out in a mediocre environment (that depends).
That was the first european championship that had an outcome on the vote (a ridiculous outcome!). Yes, probably a number of reasons were in place but look at this: http://www.rsssf.com/miscellaneous/europa-poy.html A number of British players also made the top five between 1956 and 1971. How about that? Because they played backward football?
For Krokko and others, Found the official FIFA stamped technical study. http://www.fifa.com/mm/document/afdeveloping/technicaldevp/50/09/65/wc_74_tr_312.pdf Keep in mind that this official FIFA report obviously tells the politically correct story, understandably hailing the victors and 'dominant forces'. You can also look at who sat in the supervising board and keep in mind who are 'natural allies' of each other in the football world - i.e. tend to align on key issues and have a similar mindset. But guess to whom the term 'total football' is applied in this officially legitimized story (they also applaud the Polish team btw).
Scandalous! What were they thinking back in '72? Of course the votes submitted by a variety of sports writers in 1972 are easily outweighed by one guy's observations taking place 40 years later.
With all due respect but it is a matter of connecting the dots. If a number of the voters said that those three aren't necessarily the best players of Europe nor did they have individually the best calender year, then I put my question marks yes. Especially when it is the first european championship with a significant effect and to such a large effect too. Did these top three players play well? Undoubtedly. Never forget, your opinions are just also an opinion. From the 100 greatest of all-time thread: Did this single opinion, almost 40 years later, outweigh the naked statistics and opinions of contemporary peers who identified Deyna as the driving force of the strong Poland teams, playing well at a greater number of tournaments with greater importance? Yes it did: Similarly, applying the 'total football' label to a number of countries, even retrospectively (like the Hungarians - which makes sense), is also an opinion. No matter who calls you "a member of great standing", everyone makes conclusions at the borders of reality, looking back 40 years earlier. That is not necessarily wrong by the way, as argued by several people in the 'Garrincha is an overrated dribbler thread'. https://www.bigsoccer.com/community/threads/garrincha-overrated-dribbler.1984542/
A good point. Messi is capable of creating his own space, but it's true that he has more and more relied on his team mates in the past two years (it is obvious when watching him for Argentina, that he can force matters when he wants to) and become somewhat of a glorified poacher. Two reasons come to mind: 1. his opting for long-term consistency over peak brilliance (ie, saving energy or being "lazy", whichever way you look at it); 2. or, and this is just a guess, to stroke his ego in his "battle" with C. Ronaldo, who is even less relevant in overall play, by outscoring him as much as possible. I much prefer the Messi of 2008-11 to the current version (for Barcelona at least; reverse for Arg); and especially his 2009-10 season. I disagree on your Ibrahimovic theory for that season too; Messi was individually at his best then IMO: he was so much more involved in every move, superior all-round, while Ibrahimovic never quite managed to get in sync with his team mates (his link-up play was the poorest of his entire career at Barça, and so many moves broke down because of his sloppy passing or faulty decision-making; the lack of dynamism and confidence came near the end of the 1st half of the season before he lost his starting place, not after as you've claimed many times). Messi has had more impressive performances this season than last, but still not to his form under Guardiola's first three years. That Milan 2nd leg was very reminiscent in the sense that he never stopped running/pressing in that game; his work rate went from "non-existent" back to early career levels. Messi still has flashes of brilliance in build-up play though and while his overall passing & chance creation has also become more sloppy than in previous seasons (think the stats will back me up on this), he has improved his long range passing exponentially (and also his free-kicks). versus Valencia versus Málaga versus Real Madrid versus Real Sociedad etc. etc. ... The Málaga one is my favourite of those.
Playing backward football doesn't mean you don't have talents. But if you do it for a long time, talents will become rare.
Lots of the criticsm of the British game (like Xabi Alonso's complaint about the British fixation with tackles) have been more or less the same since the Hungary match in 1953. If they still sound very much the same, it indicates - in my opinion - a certain rigidity in the mentality. German football has changed enormously in these 60 years, so has Spanish, Swedish, Italian, Argentinian and surely also Dutch football. Why hasn't English?
Repped for a good post. Did you make those gifs by yourself or are the lend from Bada Bing? Want to clarify something. I do not think Ibra was ever at his best at Barcelona. Indeed, I often use an argument like 'even an out of shape Ibra scored many goals' ( 16 goals and 7 assists in 23 starts and 6 appearances as sub in the league ). According to whoscored he was still the 12th best player of La Liga, and fourth best of Barcelona, behind Messi, Xavi and Alves. I do think though, and this is true in my belief, that Guardiola mishandled him. Ibra was his club topscorer, over Messi, and putting your club topscorer out of the team is very rare. Even if someone plays sub-par, it is a strange move. Regarding your second point, when exactly lost he his starting place in your view? http://www.bdfutbol.com/en/p/j12399.html?cat=-&temp=2009-10&equip=-&rival=-&noj=1 Then we can investigate that further. Key passes and through-balls per game: 09/10 - 1.9 ; 0.7 10/11 - 2.0 ; 1.0 11/12 - 2.5 ; 1.5 12/13 - 1.4 ; 0.4 Averages # of passes per game & pass accuracy: 09/10 - 44.3 ; 85.7% 10/11 - 67.7 ; 86.2% 11/12 - 63.8 ; 84.3% 12/13 - 58.3 ; 85.0% Dribbles and shots per game: 09/10 - 4.1 ; 4.7 10/11 - 5.6 ; 4.5 11/12 - 4.8 ; 5.5 12/13 - 3.8 ; 5.2 Good post True, but if your statement is true it means that ending high at Ballon d'Or was possible with both extremely backward football and extremely modern approaches. Same with the earlier point about the backwardness of the Italian game in the 1970s and 1980s. If it is true, which makes sense, then it is still not the distinguishing factor because top class English, German, Dutch etc. defenses conceded goals against the same 'minnows' too (not happening today to the same extent).
Messi has become a glorified poacher where? For Argentina? No, the poacher is Higuain who has a better scoring ratio than Messi for the NT but he has in no way been better than Messi for the NT. And lots of those Higuain goals have come from plays by Messi. For Barca he's clearly changed roles constantly pretty much for the past few years. And how many of his goals have really been sitters? Do you have a number? And people seem to ignore his assist stats. His supposed battle with Cronaldo seems to be focused on just scoring. But people don't wanto to mention assists. Right now he has more assists than Xavi and Fabregas who are more playmakers. The only player in the entire Liga who ha more assists than him is Iniesta and this is the first time Iniesta has surpased him in assists in years. So maybe, just maybe his teammates rely on him to be able to score even more.
I was talking about NT performance. You are so blinded by Messi worship that you can't accept any criticism of him, which is sad. As an Argentina fan, I want him to give a great performance at the WC next year, I'm just a bit skeptical however.
I don't hink he's blinded by Messi. But people here are actually claiming that Messi hasn't been key in winning games for Barcelona which is beyond ridiculous. Of the many examples of that happening one just happened a few weeks ago with his performance vs Milan. It's just reallt stupid to claim otherwise unless the guy has a short memory. And you know that for the NT he has been excellent for a while now.
Check the Ballon d'Or top 5 positions during the 1970s: West Germany placed 20 players in the top quintet, tiny Holland alone as many (11) as "backwards" England (5) & Italy (6) together. And the only British player that won the title, Kevin Keegan, represented HSV. Interesting to check the number of goals scored in the "revolutionary" leagues compared to the "conservatory" ones: in Germany, where the offense had priority, there were in average 3.30 goals per match during the 70s. In Italy, where the catenaccio mentality still survived, the average was staggering 2.03. England certainly wasn't as defensive as Italy, but the average of 2.54 was very low indeed and showed how little space was given to the constructive players.
Spanish media criticized Zlatan heavily in the second half of the season and France Football ranked him Barcelona's second worst flop signing in history.
The mission of Messi with Argentina NT is harder than it looks, I guess. Honestly, to win a World Cup, Messi will have more difficulties than Maradona had... and there is no way compare to Pelé and Ronaldo. Still, I realize that this is an opinion that is not 'shared' by other members here, and in others foruns/discussions. Anyway, the discussion over the ages, it wasn't my objective to start a new discussion, I just think that 10 years vs 4 years is a unjust duel. It's true. Honestly, I am not a Barcelona fan, but I was happy with this game in particular. See Messi playing as in ''his best days'' (it is curious to say it, he's only 25) is incredible. Before, I said he was playing as 'Mario Gomez mode'... scoring goals, but less participatory. It was an impression without consulting statistics.
The more goals scored, the better? Also, do you think Keegan his best years were in Germany? If not, I rest my case. A flawed poll. No surprise ofc if you look at who sponsored it. Keegan was as good, maybe better, for Liverpool as later on at HSV. Do you have a source? Yes, I know the criticism.
There is certainly a pathological level of goal scoring, and Italy, Albania and Turkey touched that level for quite a few years. Germany and Holland were the big "climbers" in the 70s and both had healthy scorelines. Italy was the most decadent country and also had the worst goal production. I'm not sure Keegan was at the top in those years, but surely he had more space in the Bundesliga. He talked about the big difference between the two leagues in an interview with Wolf Lyberg, the president of the Swedish Olympic Committee in 1978. He mentioned the low ticked prices in England as one of the major problems: clubs had little money and couldn't afford buying good players from abroad, with the level affected negatively.
Don't forget the expectations when he arrived: Camp Nou was full in the Gamper match where he was presented and Zlatan himself was almost weeping of happiness. What people didn't realize - yet - was that Zlatan doesn't accept not to be the undisputed #1 in any team. In the NT he had big problem with Fredrik Ljungberg. When Arsenal was almost unbeatable, Ljungberg explained some of Wenger's methods during NT meetings, and Zlatan got very annoyed by that. Just to take one ex. And of course value-for-money ratio counts. Zlatan was the most expensive and highest paid footballer, but for half of the season he was completely lost. That's just not good enough, especially when you cannot adapt to the local culture and clearly do not understand the values of the club you represent.
I agree that he was one of the biggest flops in relation to his potential/what was expected. But on the other hand Puck is right that even a subpar Zlatan wasn't one of those signing that was totally useless like that Shakhtar Donetsk defender for 25M. What do you think about his time at Juventus?
Help me out, who sponsored the Ballon d'Or? Do you hint at a manipulation taking place? The journalists of various European newspapers were asked to vote for certain players and not to vote for those who they really felt deserved their vote? And isn't it a bit unlikely that no journalist made a story out of that "you vote for who our sponsor wants you to vote" order? Not one tiny story about that in 40 years? Wouldn't that make a great headline? (Rigging the results is not a feasible option as each journalist's vote was published). More details on this mischievious scheming please.
Just linked those gifs which are indeed from Bada Bing, it's a handy feature to quickly illustrate something. Re: Ibra, certainly he feels hard done by, that is known. I was going on it more based off memory, so my idea when writing that was starting in March that he began losing prominence (not exactly dropped from first team like I stated, but in some games the first one to be subbed out when it wasn't going well), and then in April wasn't included against Real Madrid, which was a vital game for the league title. My personal feeling was that he had started very strong, then went off the boil, then had some okay performance and scoring some winning goals here and there, but the actual turning point for his career at Barça was probably when Messi went on that fantastic run of form in March. 6 March 2010 -- Almería 2 - 2 FC Barcelona [Ibra sent off with a straight red with Barça down 2-1 / Messi scores two equalisers] 14 March 2010 -- FC Barcelona 3 - 0 Valencia [Ibra suspended / Messi scores a hat-trick] 17 March 2010 -- FC Barcelona 4 - 0 Stuttgart [Ibra comes on as a sub on 66' with score at 3-0 / Messi scores opener and 3rd goal] 21 March 2010 -- Zaragoza 2 - 4 FC Barcelona [Ibra has a torrid time, missing many chances created for him by Messi and Pedro, scores a pen. to make it 2-4 / Messi scores a hat-trick and when Zaragoza come back to 2-3 he wins the pen. and gives it to Ibra] I know it isn't a straight comparison between them both, but it became clear at this point IMO that Barça would be fine without Ibra too as long as they could create the fluidity up front that Messi thrives on (worked with both Henry and Bojan + Pedro). The one good game he had in this period was Arsenal away where he scored twice, but then he didn't even feature in the return leg where Messi scored 4 when Barça were 0-1 down. Then he did play against Inter in the SF both legs and he offered nothing much in either leg, it's there that he became the full-fledged scapegoat, but I don't see how this is Guardiola's fault. My feeling in a lot of those games was that Ibra came to Barça as the king, scoring in 5 first league games (a record) when Messi rested some games/came in as a sub, but when they hit top gear he knew that he would never be the main man and that gnawed at him. There's a huge contrast in his goal celebrations and general demeanour on the pitch in September-October to even as early as December. For a more statistical approach -- The sample size of results with/without Ibra isn't incredibly big, but relevant enough IMO (and remember we're talking here about a season where they only had a lead of 1 point ahead of RM on the final matchday, so every league game was important) In Liga & CL with Ibra: 39 games, 28W 8D 3L In Liga & CL without Ibra: 11 games, 9W, 2D, 0L (incl. tough away games to Valencia, Athletic, Real Madrid and Sevilla + home games against Internazionale, Valencia and Arsenal) Guardiola bet on one horse and you can't really say he lost, if you look at 2010/11.
Of course he wasn't useless, but people thought, when he arrived, that he was almost at the same level as Messi and he was indeed paid for that. Not for acting spectator, like he did in quite a few matches during the spring.
Ever heard of lobbying? Peer pressure? That kind of psychological processes? Of course it matters who sponsors that. Like a Dutch saying goes "the ones provide bread spread the talk" (something like that, it is derived from the Bible). Keegan was indeed as good for Liverpool wasn't he? And he won European club trophies. Scored important goals. But no continental-wide personal accolades. Not to mention the fact that also German players (or managers of those players) accused the likes of Blokhin and Cruijff of rigging the vote. And don't say that isn't true because then I'll post the newspaper articles here. So it was certainly not totally alien to them, that lobbying, manipulating and bending.