Guest Post: The True Greats, A List
By: Corey | July 4th, 2009
Totally Unrelated Picture, But Funny None The Less
Since I am on vacation and Cesar has filled in wonderfully for me, I feel like using more of my regular readers to provide content for the site. I mean, it is a blog geared to you, so like-mined fans should be able to find some common ground when it comes to content for the site. So without much more ado, here is a submission from regular reader Kaushik.
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While I’ve grown up watching the beautiful game, I have often wondered, who are the greatest set of players that I have been priviliged to grow up watching. If there was ever a dream team of the greatest players of our generation, who would it be. Here’s my list. Opinions and refutations are most welcome.
Goal Keeper – Iker Casillas – He’s my favourite. He’s won so many titles in so few years, when he’s so young. And in my opinion the number 1 shot blocker in the game. Buffon’s better in some aspects, but Casillas is the overall package for me.
Right Back – Cafu – What a joy he was to watch spring up and down that right wing. A great champion, a great man, and also a great football player. Probably one of the greatest ever to play the position, barring Garrincha. He’s an automatic choice in this team.
Centre Backs – Alesandro Nesta and Paolo Maldini – Nesta is one of the modern day greats and Italians have always led the way in showing how one defends. Maldini, is one of the game’s elites, possibly the greatest defender. These two would make a killer twosome at the centre of the defence.
Left Back – Roberto Carlos – Complementing Cafu on the right, Carlos would be an awesome add to the left side. One of the best long range shooters ever to have played the game, he was a terror on the wing in his days, and is almost an automatic choice for this position
Right Wing – Luis Figo – What a winger, multiple winner of the World and European player of the year awards and a menace down the wing in his days, has scored plenty of wonderful goals and almost carried the Portugal team when he led it.
Centre Midfielders – Claude Makelele and Pavel Nedved – Makelele is the best ever DM that I have seen. Pre Galactico era, Madrid were that stable because of him, and Galactico and post that, they weren’t because of the same guy. Rock in front of the defense, is actually a pleasure to watch even if he is the DM. Nedved, although plays for my most hated team Juve, takes this place mainly because of one performance against Real where he scored a hat-trick to send us out of the CL. What a class performer, truly deserves the spot on this team.
Left Wing – Zinedine Zidane – My footballing god, the greatest player to have ever touched a football, the scorer of the most beautiful goal, I cannot stop talking about this guy. If there’s one person I miss in the Real team and the world of football its my beloved Zizou. So versatile, so classy, nothing more needs to be told I suppose.
Forwards – Thierry Henry and Ronaldo – Henry, I personally do not like him that much, but his records stand out. He will always be one step below the greats because of his money minded move to Barca, but he is a classy striker he is on the pitch. Fatty Ronaldo, who is the greatest striker of our generation, is well, a shame to a young fan, but his talent was undeniable. Those stepovers, those quick dashes, and not to mention, the great finishing skills make him truly deserve this spot.
PS – Near Misses : Del Piero, Giggs, Pirlo, Ferdinand
PPS – Far Misses : Kaka, Messi, Iniesta, CR9? They have to achieve lots more before being considered for this.
Comment away people.
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Great stuff from Kaushik! Feel free to comment of course, and maybe give your best ever 11 that you had the pleasure of watching. And remember that you are more then welcome to send me a post if you would like. Email it to me at cnfiske@gmail.com, and I will put it up. Im enjoying my mini vacation from blogging down in southern New Jersey. The house I am staying at is about a block away from the beach and its been sunny and beautiful all week. I will be back in time for preseason, but until then keep supporting Cesar, he is doing a great job.
And lets keep the bickering and insulting to a minimum too 
Category: Team News
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Comments | Add your comment
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Benzema is a “made” star? He is 21 years old, hasn’t played outside of the French league, hasn’t played too many games for his national team, and is still very wet behind the ears. Benzema is a young prospect that hasn’t proven anything yet. Don’t throw in random vague adjectives to make yourself feel better about your team just so it helps you sleep better at night. How is Benzema so much different than Ronaldinho in terms of “madeness” (whatever that means) when they were bought?
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JC I hear you what about villa and masch though ? Point I’m trying to make is laporta is an hypocrite
I Hate Madrid ronaldinho was a star already when barca bought him everybody wanted him didn’t you watch the world cup 2002 ?and yes we do buy stars because madrid believes that the best should wear our jersey , it has also helped us become the biggest revenu generating club but remember under calderon we have hardly bought any made stars and he was the president for 3 long years and there were a lot of madrid teams like that in the past
Barca do develop a lot I give you that but ask anybody who’ve been a cule for a decade or so barca used to buy a LOT BIg names aka already made stars its when their finances when astray. At some point that they cut it down and focus on the cantera more , not saying that this the only reason why they’ve decided to do so but it has a lot to do with it
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Went astray* not when
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@ IHM:
“Meanwhile, real madrid bought made stars like kaka, ronaldo, benzama, huntleaar, RVN, VDV, and the list goes on and on.”
as TSDrew said, Benzema’s not quite a made star. And neither is Huntelaar, and possibly even VDV, although that depends on one’s perspective.
If you consider Huntelaar a readymade star, then Eto’o most definitely counts as one too, possibly even moreso seeing as he had been playing in the spanish league for ages, and commanded a transfer fee of about 17 million if i recall correctly, which isn’t that far off huntelaar’s considering the inflation in today’s transfer market.
Andres, I’d have to disagree with Ronaldinho being a star when Barca bought him. His talent was clear to see, and yeah he’d won a world cup, but he was going off the rails at PSG due to indiscipline, and Barca took a chance on him, and made him into a star.
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Sambit I hear you but I stand by statement barcelona did not make ronaldinho a star
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Ronaldinho had potential when he left PSG, but he wasn’t a “star”. A star is what he is now, because everyone knows his name. No matter how well Dinho performed in the 2002 World Cup, he was still overshadowed by the other Rs, Ronaldo and Rivaldo. I wouldn’t say Benzema is a star yet, but he is a well known player. Dinho became a star at Barca because even people who didn’t follow soccer, knew who Dinho was. He won 2 World Player of the Years(should have been 3) with us and was truly a star by the time he left.
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IHM, your last name must be Laporta, because you sound just like Laporta…
Wasn’t Gaspart who brought almost the entire national dutch team? Please, look at your past history before and think before you type…; you’re lucky you’re enjoying a great number of homegrown players, but that hasn’t been always the norm, so don’t make it sound as if barcelona has ALWAYS ONLY relied on la catera, and we haven’t, because that’s just dumb….
It’s true that due to the abandonment of our cantera we’ve had to buy more than we’d like, but it’s also true that wasn’t always the case, there have been many homegrown players coming out of La Fabrica, too bad they’re playing elsewhere (mata, granero, Negredo, just to name a few)
But it’s also true that our history obliges us to try to lure the best talent to our team, just as Milan, Man U, Barcelona, Juventus, Inter, etc try to do, that come with being a successful club…
HALA MADRID!!! And keep the best players coming!!!
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only 8 positions? strange.
besides, xavi and iniesta have to do more? 2 CL’s some leagues, triplete, Euro 2008… they only have to sign for madrid I guess. Zidane was better yes, but only him.
the only midfielders on the list are “centre midfielders” … typical from a Real fan, there are things called “mediapuntas” and “interiores” in spanish… I don’t know the name in english sorry
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on the xabi alonso subject the amazing Andres was replying me about…I think lass is one of the key players in your team so… are you going to play with 2 defensive midfielders (lass-xabi)? That way kaka can play as 10 and be more “defence free”. I really want to see what pellegrini will do… I also think pellegrini will not play with 2 def mids, although madrid has always been able to change anyone’s mind
I guess this is what madrikitas want to happen:
——-iker———
ramos-albiol-pepe-xxx xxx marcelo or other
—–xabi-lass——
——-kaka———
xxx–benzema—cr9 xxxx pipita, robben or otherremeber kaka is not Zidane
and FCB has shown the world that playing with one def mid and two offensive mids (or “interiores”), with both of them taking the organising responsabilities you can drive the rival nuts.
I really hope you play with 2 def mids and FCB with only 1, so this is a war between catenaccio and art football… but pellegrini is a smart coach I think.
THIS YEAR IS GOING TO BE GREAT FOR ALL FOOTBALL FANS!
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Mku xabi alonso is not your typical DM in case you haven’t figured that out yet and the reason why barca can afford to play with “only one” DM is because of the way the team as whole , henry , eto’o , messi , xavi everybody pressurized the hell out of the rivals
And what is it that you’re barking about “catennacio” don’t be a jack ass since when has madrid played catennacio ?
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Correction * its because the way the team defend as a whole *
I think way faster than I type
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I was obviously exagerating about the catenaccio concerning next year but… Take a look at Barcelona vs Madrid in Camp Nou to fully understand the catenaccio concept, amazing Andres. AND CAPELLO WAS LONG GONE
I think that xabi can only play as 4 and never on his own since he doesn’t defend very well (unlike lass, yaya or masche). Xabi cannot play on his own and he cannot play as offensive mid since his skill is very limited, so a priori he will come to play in a two-man defensive midfield. But as I said I think Pellegrini will try something in order to seem a truly offensive team. To try to look half as good as we do
What about Raul, will he play next year? Will he go to the world?
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correction: world CUP
i’t gonna be really hard to fit benzema, kaka, cr9, pipita, huntelaar, vancorner, robben AND RAUL in the team.
Real needs more skilled midfielders and not strikers, without a good midfield the strikers won’t get any ball in proper conditions. You will have a killer attack next season, I don’t know if better than FCB’s but killer indeed, but I still think that FCB’s midfield will always be the best on earth. Imagine if we sign Mascherano and you don’t sign Xabi Alonso. There are not many Xavi-Iniesta-Yaya level midfielders in the world.
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He conveniently did not re-sign so Barca could nick him for almost free
Ahem.. http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/teams/a/arsenal/4996270.stm
Henry signed a four year renewal in 2006 and we ‘nicked’ him with three years left on his contract.. So the ‘low’ transfer fee should be attributed to Arsenal..
BTW its a ‘great’ idea for a post..
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Mku I like how you conveniently turn robben , kaka and ronaldo ( ok he may play as a second striker sometimes ) when they all really play in midfield , our midfield might not be as good as barca’s but it is good nonetheless an in form sneijder plus an in form vdv , kaka , robben diarra lass = a great midfield
all we’re missing is a creative CM that has some defensive attritubes which is why we’re going for alonsoPosted from
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O and you don’t have to play with a single defensive mid to achieve success we’ve proved that before in the del bosque days , man utd proved it a couple of years ago milan did it and so on
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First off, I have to admit I was wrong with the “made stars” comment. I have not been a barca fan very long, a few years only (because of their style).
I want to go back to the diarra debate.
Some of you said he didnt do well in big games because his team sucked. Well, I think thats totally wrong. He gave the ball away against Barca, it was his fault and only HIS fault. Same with the liverpool giveaway. Same with getting beaten in the air in the 1st leg.
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wow, I’ll save IHM/ICLWOM’s last post!!!! for him to admit he was wrong, wow, that’s a first!!!
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Whats ICLWOM?
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I Cant Live without Madrid.
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I am a newbie to the world of football so please excuse my elementary questions. But is there a salary cap in the football world like there is in lets say the NBA? Real has a lot of new signings but it doesn’t seem like they’ve offloaded anyone. Another question is where would Higuain fit in the new Real 11?
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Anna, certain leagues do have salary cap restrictions, for example the A-League (in Australia), and I’m almost certain that the MLS in America has a salary cap. But generally there is no salary cap in Europe.
I suspect we’ll be getting rid of the deadweight in our squad pretty soon.
As for Higuain, he has GOT to be a starter, surely. I don’t think Benzema can start over him to be honest, Higuain has proven himself
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Nedved instead of Zizou in the center? Zizou was the definition of a center midfielder. On every team that he played for the ball came through him, and it was his duty to create opportunities for his teammates. I’d stick him there easily instead of Nedved. Then I’d put a real winger out on the left.
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Finnegan, the problem is that there hasn’t been a world class left winger for ages, the only one I can think about is Giggs, but he isn’t the kind of player you’d call legendary, unless you’re a MAN-Ure fan…
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Ronaldinho circa 2004-2006?
I think that counts as world class (if you are using rather arbitrary criteria). Props on the topic, gents.
Zidane as a false left winger worked because RM had Roberto Carlos to bomb forward and take over the wing to keep the width of the field. This, however, necessitated a rather more defensive right back. Interestingly, Barcelona does something somewhat similar albeit on the opposite side and much further forward in the field with Messi cutting in and Alves bombing forward while Abidal stays back. However, Cafu in his prime was the original attacking FB. Consider putting Maldini at Left FB (where he made his name with Sacchi and Capello) replacing Roberto Carlos and putting in maybe Hierro at CB (I still hate the SOB but damn, he was good) to get more balance on the line. Move Zidane next to Makalele, take ol Pavel out and put Ronaldinho (assuming 04-06 version) in at left wing. No qualms with Ronaldo and Henry (in their primes). If you can go further back, I would replace Judas with another guy who played for both Barca and Madrid, Michael Laudrup. Sure, maybe he doesn’t have the WPOY’s or Golden Balls but anybody who saw him live knows there is no comparison. One of the best I’ve ever seen and one of the most underrated players ever.
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cr9 is not a midfielder, he does not understand the game like a midfielder does… he is very good but doing his thing, not running a team’s midfield. kaka can be closer to being a midfielder, but he is a 10… a guy that is there only to attack, same thing with wesley sneijder. a midfielder has to dominate many aspects of the game and RUN THE MIDFIELD, organize. So you still have gago, lass, mamadou, ruben garcia and parejo (or jurado whatever his name is). xabi alonso is a very limited player, he reminds me of guardiola but without that much brain… I think you need a much more creative midfielder, one that can defend and also dribble and score. I don’t know if you know him but a guy like CANI from Vila-real would fit… a guy that can do it all. He is not a galcatico, but he is the king of player I’m talking about. there is a galactico that would fit, but he has principles so forget about signing him: STEVEN GERRARD.
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