Diego Armando Maradona Franco: How Great is he?

[StarLord]

Having stumbled upon these clips on youtube, it got me wondering: "How good was Maradona?" I know that comparisons between him and Leo are inevitable, but I think that it is more of an exercise in futility. I am more intrigued by how much different football was back then in terms of everything. The amount of money involved, the quality of the pitches, tactics, fitness, the amount of foreigners teams were allowed to have etc etc etc. Please feel free to provide any information you feel is relevant to the great Diego Maradona and his illustrious career.

I am more than impressed by how good he was at dead-ball situations.

 

[antonnn]

Tbh he had more grace bout him that a lot of players from right now, and his free kick skills were fucking bonkers. There are too many efficient machines now like Ronaldo, players are less attractive to watch. Not to mention Diego played in an era where guys tried to kill each other on the field, attacking players weren't a protected celebrity species like they are now... Man, Ronaldo and a lot of top stars from now wouldn't live past 3 games back then. That, and he defeated one of the all time grade sides in Milan for the league with God damn Napoli, though never did too well in the CL. Monster player though, and imo Maradona > Pele, who never left Brazil, though Brazil was stronger back then as many of them never left their league, but even then Brazil wasn't known for great defending. Credit to Pele for his WC exploits, but not leaving Brazil takes away from his legacy for me.

 

[KyletheMuslim]

He took Drugs.....

 

[JamDav1982]

Discussions about Maradona inevitably end with someone listing myths they have heard before.

'Maradona came to Napoli and turned them single handed into Italian Champions in toughest league of all time'

That is nowhere near the truth.

As great a player as he was I tend to think he is a but over rated on that one world cup for what he actually achieved in the rest of his career.

 

[mehdimike]

Diego Armando Maradona Franco: How Great is he?
Having stumbled upon these clips on youtube, it got me wondering: "How good was Maradona?" I know that comparisons between him and Leo are inevitable, but I think that it is more of an exercise in futility. I am more intrigued by how much different football was back then in terms of everything. The amount of money involved, the quality of the pitches, tactics, fitness, the amount of foreigners teams were allowed to have etc etc etc. Please feel free to provide any information you feel is relevant to the great Diego Maradona and his illustrious career.

U know.it's intersting that i exactly did the same thing yesterdayWatching some of his clips in net(youtube)

And was really really shocked!!!

His style of walking,running and dribbling was just like messi!

the funiest thing was that they couldn't stop him even by foul,again like messi

 

[Ode to Django]

You could actually make a tackle back then, incredible stuff

 

[JamDav1982]

You could actually make a tackle back then, incredible stuff

I watched the full 90mins of Argie WC 1986 games and was shocked by how protected Maradona was by the referees.

Any slight touch that caused him to go down was given as a foul.

Nowhere close to this idea of Maradona vs hatchet man allowed to break his legs every tackle.

 

[StarLord]

I watched the full 90mins of Argie WC 1986 games and was shocked by how protected Maradona was by the referees.

Any slight touch that caused him to go down was given as a foul.

Nowhere close to this idea of Maradona vs hatchet man allowed to break his legs every tackle.

I have watched that game from beginning to end myself and you are right, fouls were given easily back then as well. But in other games from the 80s, some refs were more forgiving to defenders, not so much by not whistling fouls but by not giving cards as easily as they do today.

 

[XaviMessiGirl]

You could actually make a tackle back then, incredible stuff

Philippe Mexes likes this.

 

[StarLord]

The notion that Maradona was the only worthy player at Napoli is quite ludicrous. There were also Ferrara, Alemao, Careca and by 89/90 Zola as well. Lots of others too. Remember also that all the other teams were also limited with how many foreigners they could bring in.

God, I wish football could become like that again. Only two or three foreigners in any club.

 

[XaviMessiGirl]

What's wrong with foreigners? I mean it is nice when you are able to find worthy local players, of course it is, but there is nothing wrong with having foreign players if they're good enough. But I guess I shouldn't be surprised at this given all your past history on the forum.

 

[StarLord]

What's wrong with foreigners? I mean it is nice when you are able to find worthy local players, of course it is, but there is nothing wrong with having foreign players if they're good enough. But I guess I shouldn't be surprised at this given all your past history on the forum.

Hahaha, what?

The point of not having teams play with foreigners all around is to allow the best footballing nations to shine through and also impose some kind of equity among clubs within leagues as well. As things stand now, only 5 to maximum 10 clubs can ever hope to win the CL, while national leagues have become a parody of themselves. Back then you could have Verona or Nottingham Forrest or Real Sociedad win their leagues, and Steaua and Red Star Belgrade win the European Cup, or Videoton reaching the UEFA Cup final. Now the few very rich clubs can hoard all the best players on the planet for themselves.

 

[antonnn]

Discussions about Maradona inevitably end with someone listing myths they have heard before.

'Maradona came to Napoli and turned them single handed into Italian Champions in toughest league of all time'

That is nowhere near the truth.

As great a player as he was I tend to think he is a but over rated on that one world cup for what he actually achieved in the rest of his career.

Who said single handedly? And did I say the toughest league of all time? Nope. He had a nice team, but not a Serie A winning team, without him they'd have win squat and you know it.. Ma-Gi-Ca were great though. And who said every tackle was an attempted leg breaker? Yep, again not me. But back in those days defenders were rougher, everybody knows it. You're just exaggerating things now.

He took Drugs.....

And he was still the best, despite them being drugs that did NOT enhance his performance, in fact, a cocaine addiction will lessen your ability by probably 30%+. I couldn't even function on that stuff trying to do what I do in my everyday life if I tried, let alone playing up to 180 minutes of football in a week. Nobody said he's a great role model, he isn't, anyone who takes drugs is not a good role model no matter how you look at it, but on the football pitch he had no equal back then.

 

[XaviMessiGirl]

Hahaha, what?

The point of not having teams play with foreigners all around is to allow the best footballing nations to shine through and also impose some kind of equity among clubs within leagues as well. As things stand now, only 5 to maximum 10 clubs can ever hope to win the CL, while national leagues have become a parody of themselves. Back then you could have Verona or Nottingham Forrest or Real Sociedad win their leagues, and Steaua and Red Star Belgrade win the European Cup, or Videoton reaching the UEFA Cup final. Now the few very rich clubs can hoard all the best players on the planet for themselves.

That is not the foreign players' fault, but the fault of the system that allows sugar daddies and all the rich clubs to inflate the market. And you see it with domestic players too, look how much Liverpool spent a few years ago to try to build an English core and most of those players are/were average at best. But that's the "English tax" for you.

 

[StarLord]

That is not the foreign players' fault, but the fault of the system that allows sugar daddies and all the rich clubs to inflate the market. And you see it with domestic players too, look how much Liverpool spent a few years ago to try to build an English core and most of those players are/were average at best.

Of course it is not the foreigners fault, I am not agitating against immigration or anything, I don't know why you perceive my statement in that vain.

The problem is with a free-market dogma that has transformed football into an oligopolistic enterprise that forecloses on the dreams of hundreds of clubs/nations. You can take several measures in order to make things more fair (such as a salary cap) but in my opinion, limiting the number of foreign players that a club is allowed to have on their books is the simplest and most efficient one. By allowing clubs to buy any number of foreign players you allow the richest ones to just buy world-class players (or near that level) in each and every position and the result is what we see today.

If you have other suggestions, then I am more than happy to hear them.

Edit: The Liverpool example is a very good vindication of what I am saying. If you try to be "patriotic" with your choice of players, then you are 99% doomed. Not even Barca/Real have so many Spaniards today playing for them (Ok, we still do have some) and that is with Spain producing top players by the bucket-load.