They have to win a world cup to be considered great?

People acting as though Pele is GOAT when all they've seen of him are youtube highlights from world cups.

Not even top 10.

Honestly, I think saying he isn't top 10 is just as bad. Have you seen bad games from him?

I've seen several WC games where he has great performances, but since he never played in Europe (and in Brazil he only played in a regional league as the national league didn't exist until 1970) I have a hard time rating him as one of the best. It's weird but from my experience it's easier to find games of Di Stefano and Puskas than Pelé, even though they're around a decade older.

I personally feel much more comfortable saying Maradona is the best player in the history of football while Pelé is the best player in the history of World Cups.

Not really, there are loads of great players to pick from that have won a lot more and been more impressive than Pele. Put Messi, Ronaldo, Zlatan or Aguero in the Brazilian league and they'd destroy it. I really don't understand the big focus on international football, world cups are every 4 years you can easily miss them due to injury or have a shitty manager that plays you in the wrong position or get really bad luck and you only have 2-3 opportunities in your career to do it. Pele was involved in 4 world cups simply because his age timed well with his footballing career, but no one seems to mention that.

I have NEVER seen a football player play at the level of Messi. Ronaldo is not near his level when you factor in everything except scoring goals. I think the Brazilian Ronaldo was closer (I rate him 3rd best of all time after Messi and Maradona).

I can understand rating Maradona higher than Messi but not any other player really. Lol'd at dude saying Ronaldinho before.

e/ also I'm aware these are all opinions BUT let's be real here, there is a level of objectivity to it.

This post was edited by dro94 on Nov 21 2016 04:26pm

He didn't though, he was in the World Cup final and 3 Copa America finals, much like all the other players mentioned, so we can judge him on it, in relation to the other legends mentioned he was found wanting in the final stages of each of those tournaments.

I watched all of Zidane, Ronaldo, Cristiano and Messi's careers and can comfortably say Zidane and Ronaldo > Messi and Cristiano

Well, several players like Di Stefano, Puskás, Platini and even even Eusebio have dominated in a very similar way to Cristiano and Messi, but also managing to do so in international level.

Then there are players like Cruyff or Zidane who are often labeled as one part of the GOATs, but they are so more because of their ball control and intelligence rather than their goal scoring. Zico falls into this category as well, but he only played n Europe during his latter years, so when rating him we face similar problems to the ones we run into when rating Pelé or Garrincha.

In more recent times, Ronaldinho in his prime was just as good as Messi or Cristiano imo, but he only lasted two years so I'll never even rate him any were close to being in the top 20 of all time. And as far as pure skill goes, Djalminha is probably the most skilled I've ever seen, but he lacked tactical intelligence and he threw his career over board due to his lack of motivation.

And then there's the legend of "El Trinche" Carlovich, who received salary bonuses for every nutmeg he'd make and several argentinian managers to this day claim was better than Maradona, Messi and anyone else, but there's no video footage of him. I don't think he counts though as he never played at the highest level, but he must have had some mad skills

I think Ronaldo was a legend and absolutely amazing, but I personally think others have achieved more than him (and more consistently throughout the years), so I probably wouldn't go as far as having him in a top 5 (I would have him in a top 10 though). I do believe though that if hadn't suffered those injuries he could have become the absolute GOAT... at 19-20 he was already the best in the world by a mile, it was crazy.

PS: I'm assuming ofc that we're talking solely about offensive players.

People will often focus on goals and translate that into dominance, which is why the players in the first group I mentioned in my previous post will often get more credit, but guys like Zidane or Cruyff absolutely dominated thabks to their intelligence, as they made their teams so much better.

Zidane was an absolute monster in big games. He was very dominant despite not having the flashiness of players like Maradona.



This is him in the biggest stage of them all, the WC final. It's amazing how every little detail is just pure class. This is easily the best ever performance in a WC final.

This post was edited by zarkadon on Nov 21 2016 05:26pm

well, a wc is the very last step to be a legend

i think that messi is a more talented player than maradona, but maradona will (most likely) always be above him

aside from that many players do not the attention they deserve, guys like xavi or lahm for example



hands down, zidane was the best ever

Agree.

CR7 didn't really have WC success because his team always sucked. Put him on Argentina and I bet he'll win at least one