9 - Samuel Eto'o

[Temptation]

Not all finals are created equal.

Things like WC final or CL final have HUGE legacy weightage.

Sure but you have to take the context into account here.

It's a very tiny sample space with 2 finals in the CL. He had a very good game against PSG even though he didn't score.

He has a great record in the CL knockout stages which are also very big games. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Lewy also scored in the only WC knockout he ever played against France.

 

[BerkeleyBernie]

Messi's finishing is greater than Etoo's. Etoo could be wasteful with easy chances to increase his number of goals. But he was super clutch (and quick, fast, agressive, hardworking).

A dream striker for any team.

Not saying Messi's not, overall. But, like I said, the stat may have been Champion's League only, and for a certain number of years. Eto'o was clearly the most efficient of that group of top players.

 

[khaled_a_d]

Dude Lewandowski won a sextuple as the main man, topscorer and player of the tournament in every single competition with an absurd scoring rate and incredible all round performances all season. He broke Gerd Muller's all time record despite a long injury scoring 41 goals in 28 games. How many players ever have done that?

Lewandowski has like 23 goals in finals. Only Messi and Ronaldo have more.

Only Messi and Ronaldo have more knockout stage goals and CL goals than Lewandowski. His highest scoring season in the CL has only ever been bettered by Ronaldo (due to more number of games).

Lewandowski has 8 40+ goal seasons. For reference, Messi and Ronaldo have like 10. The next closest player has 3 40+ seasons.

A washed up tractor/grandpa version of him at Barca has comparable numbers to Prime Eto'o including big games like El Clasicos and Supercopa finals.

None of this has anything to what I've said.

Before Eto winning sextuple, there was no one before.

Before 2008, there was 4 treble winners in the history of Europe, Eto went to win 2 back to back. When Lewa won it, there was a treble winner every few years. With German and French it is essentially winning CL that wins you treble. It is hardly a big achievement as it was supposed to once suggest.

And numbers here is what I am talking about, the current numbers are inflated. Drogba looks like a mediocre starting attacker if you look at his numbers based on current era criteria, essentially a striker who retired while scoring 20+ goals in top 5 leagues only twice in his career. When in truth he was one of the best strikers in his generation and was a player that was widely feared by opponents.


So, should we just accept that everyone now is better? In that case, yeah Lewa blows Eto in any comparison. But if we contextualize the numbers, it paints a very different story than the one you are telling.


Eto is one of the few to win 3 Cl, 2 trebles, only one to do it with different teams and only one to do it back to back, 2 ACN champion, Olympic gold medalist against a strong Spanish side (that they toyed with even in penalties).