http://soccernet.espn.go.com/world-...-peleacute-maradona-cruyff?cc=3888&ver=global
People generally don't feel the urge to dignify allegations unless there is a kernel of truth to them. How telling it is then that the three consensus best players of all time -- Pelé, Diego Maradona and Johan Cruyff -- have in recent weeks found it necessary to publicly deny that Lionel Messi is, for now anyway, the best player of all time.
"They are always trying to compare someone to Pelé," Pelé recently told the British newspaper the Daily Mail.
"I always joke with my Argentine friends that they must first choose who is the best player from Argentina. Then, when one of them scores a thousand goals, then we can start talking," Pelé said, referring to the four-figure barrier he eclipsed in his own career.
"Of course the media has gotten into making comparisons in recent weeks," Johan Cruyff recently wrote in his column in Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf. "Who's better? Pelé, Maradona, Cruyff or Messi? Fun fodder but a pointless discussion if you ask me. For starters, you can't compare Messi to myself, because he's a very different type of player. More the Maradona type.
"What everyone should be happy about is that each era has its own heroes," Cruyff droned on. "Why should one be less than the other? Pelé was a hero in his time, I was in mine and Messi is now. A joy to behold. Instead of making comparisons, we should just be really satisfied that we can enjoy players like Messi and [Cristiano] Ronaldo today."
Maradona, who, as Argentina's national team manager, is the only one who stands to benefit from being eclipsed by Messi, is less dismissive of such talk. "I told him I'd done my thing, now he has to make his career and at the end we'll see who was the greatest of all time," he recently said of speaking about it to Messi. "But he's on the right path."
A few weeks earlier, Maradona was seemingly afflicted by a different mood when he told Radio Cooperativa: "I don't like comparisons. But if someone has to surpass me, then let it be an Argentine. If Leo is better, I welcome it."
Messi is suitably reverential, understanding the religion that is Diego Maradona (seriously, look it up, there's an actual organized faith with Diego's autobiography as its bible). "Diego is Diego and millions of years can pass and he will still be the greatest in history for me," Messi said to the Associated Press. "I'm not trying to be like Maradona."
Maradona, sticking with the religious theme, did say of Messi's current form that the latter is now "playing a kick-about with Jesus."
Anybody -- or three people, to be exact -- getting nervous perhaps?
Aside from Maradona's John Lennon-esque and borderline blasphemous remark -- and who says God is into soccer anyway? In Texas people seem to think He's a Cowboys fan -- the living legends seem to be doing their best to torpedo any basis for comparison. They either suggest Messi plays a different position or create unrealistic targets he must meet.
AP Photo
Pelé (center, leaning on the shoulder of goalie Gylmar Dos Santos Neves) was just 17 when he starred in the 1958 World Cup.
Pelé's claim that Messi has the minor chore of scoring a thousand goals to complete before comparisons are valid is, after all, a spurious one. Pelé conveniently counted the goals he scored in the myriad unofficial (read: scrimmage and friendly) games and tournaments he played in while at Santos. In some seasons, those outnumbered the official games he played 3-to-1. His official goal tally is more like 784, including his goals for Brazil. That's still an enormous number, and one that Messi won't possibly match. For one, he'll never come close to playing almost 100 games in a single season the way Pelé occasionally did; and secondly, Pelé had the advantage of weaker opposition. Pelé spent 18 years in the Brazilian league and three in the North American Soccer League. While the Brazilian league was no joke, even back in Pelé's time, it doesn't compare to the world-class opposition Messi faces each game in the Spanish Primera Division and in the Champions League.
It's unlikely that Messi will score half as many goals as Pelé did, and Pelé knows it.
One thing the three titans of the sport are right about, though, is that it's too soon for comparisons.
The Greats at the World Cup
Pelé
1958 (17 years old): Scored six goals, including three in the semifinal win over France and two more in the finals victory against Sweden.
1962 (21): After scoring in Brazil's opening game, he was injured in the next match and didn't play again. Brazil went on to win the World Cup.
1966 (25): Brazil was eliminated in three games, with Pelé vowing never to play in another World Cup after getting brutalized by Portugal.
1970 (29): Brazil beat Italy 4-1 in the final, with Pelé scoring the game's first goal, his fourth of the tournament, and adding two assists.
Maradona
1982 (21): Argentina lost to Brazil in the second round, with Maradona scoring twice in five matches.
1986 (25): Led Argentina to the title, scoring five goals (including this epic against England) and adding five assists.
1990 (29): Argentina reached the final, losing 1-0 to Germany, with Maradona held scoreless in the tournament.
1994 (33): Played two games, scoring one goal, before being sent home for failing a doping test. Argentina lost in the round of 16.
Johan Cruyff
1974 (27): Named the player of the tournament after leading the Netherlands to a second-place finish.
(Cruyff helped the Netherlands qualify for the 1978 World Cup, but retired from international soccer in October 1977.)
Pelé played 21 seasons of top-level soccer. Maradona played 21 too, while Cruyff played 20. Messi is in his sixth top-flight season. Anointing Messi one of the best of all time is not unlike calling a rock band the best ever after just one album, a painter a master after a handful of sketches, or an actor his generation's finest after starring in a sitcom.
Unlikely as it would seem now, it's not inconceivable that Messi will eventually flame out, the way Ronaldo (the original one) did after a prolific start to his career. Ronaldo was once a shoo-in for the "greatest of all time" debate too, mind you.
Messi's international résumé is thin. Maradona went to four World Cups and won one. Pelé went to four and won three. The only one Messi could conceivably match at this stage is Cruyff, who played in just one World Cup, in 1974, but led the Netherlands to the final.
While it has also been pointed out that Messi has won far more than Maradona had at his age (or indeed Cruyff, although not Pelé), such comparisons are unfair. Messi rolled into a superb Barcelona team that has only gotten better during his tenure -- this, admittedly, had a lot to do with his own presence. Maradona on the other hand frequently found himself carrying the teams he played for almost single-handedly.
Nevertheless, a poll on Guardian.co.uk put the question to the readership. Is Messi better than Maradona? 56.2 percent said yes.
"Messi is so good that comparisons with other players currently playing football are simply not valid," 1978 Argentinean World Cup winner and longtime Maradona teammate Ossie Ardiles recently told Reuters. "So in that sense it is right that people are comparing him with the greats of the past, like (Diego) Maradona, Pelé and (Johan) Cruyff."
But, added, Ardiles: "He's still only 22 and you have to maintain this level for many years to earn the right to be considered better than these giants."
Is the notion that Messi is on his way to being an all-time great really so preposterous? No. The potential is there. And that's all that can conclusively be said for now. Let's reexamine this in a decade. Or at least wait until July 12.
People generally don't feel the urge to dignify allegations unless there is a kernel of truth to them. How telling it is then that the three consensus best players of all time -- Pelé, Diego Maradona and Johan Cruyff -- have in recent weeks found it necessary to publicly deny that Lionel Messi is, for now anyway, the best player of all time.
"They are always trying to compare someone to Pelé," Pelé recently told the British newspaper the Daily Mail.
"I always joke with my Argentine friends that they must first choose who is the best player from Argentina. Then, when one of them scores a thousand goals, then we can start talking," Pelé said, referring to the four-figure barrier he eclipsed in his own career.
"Of course the media has gotten into making comparisons in recent weeks," Johan Cruyff recently wrote in his column in Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf. "Who's better? Pelé, Maradona, Cruyff or Messi? Fun fodder but a pointless discussion if you ask me. For starters, you can't compare Messi to myself, because he's a very different type of player. More the Maradona type.
"What everyone should be happy about is that each era has its own heroes," Cruyff droned on. "Why should one be less than the other? Pelé was a hero in his time, I was in mine and Messi is now. A joy to behold. Instead of making comparisons, we should just be really satisfied that we can enjoy players like Messi and [Cristiano] Ronaldo today."
Maradona, who, as Argentina's national team manager, is the only one who stands to benefit from being eclipsed by Messi, is less dismissive of such talk. "I told him I'd done my thing, now he has to make his career and at the end we'll see who was the greatest of all time," he recently said of speaking about it to Messi. "But he's on the right path."
A few weeks earlier, Maradona was seemingly afflicted by a different mood when he told Radio Cooperativa: "I don't like comparisons. But if someone has to surpass me, then let it be an Argentine. If Leo is better, I welcome it."
Messi is suitably reverential, understanding the religion that is Diego Maradona (seriously, look it up, there's an actual organized faith with Diego's autobiography as its bible). "Diego is Diego and millions of years can pass and he will still be the greatest in history for me," Messi said to the Associated Press. "I'm not trying to be like Maradona."
Maradona, sticking with the religious theme, did say of Messi's current form that the latter is now "playing a kick-about with Jesus."
Anybody -- or three people, to be exact -- getting nervous perhaps?
Aside from Maradona's John Lennon-esque and borderline blasphemous remark -- and who says God is into soccer anyway? In Texas people seem to think He's a Cowboys fan -- the living legends seem to be doing their best to torpedo any basis for comparison. They either suggest Messi plays a different position or create unrealistic targets he must meet.
AP Photo
Pelé (center, leaning on the shoulder of goalie Gylmar Dos Santos Neves) was just 17 when he starred in the 1958 World Cup.
Pelé's claim that Messi has the minor chore of scoring a thousand goals to complete before comparisons are valid is, after all, a spurious one. Pelé conveniently counted the goals he scored in the myriad unofficial (read: scrimmage and friendly) games and tournaments he played in while at Santos. In some seasons, those outnumbered the official games he played 3-to-1. His official goal tally is more like 784, including his goals for Brazil. That's still an enormous number, and one that Messi won't possibly match. For one, he'll never come close to playing almost 100 games in a single season the way Pelé occasionally did; and secondly, Pelé had the advantage of weaker opposition. Pelé spent 18 years in the Brazilian league and three in the North American Soccer League. While the Brazilian league was no joke, even back in Pelé's time, it doesn't compare to the world-class opposition Messi faces each game in the Spanish Primera Division and in the Champions League.
It's unlikely that Messi will score half as many goals as Pelé did, and Pelé knows it.
One thing the three titans of the sport are right about, though, is that it's too soon for comparisons.
The Greats at the World Cup
Pelé
1958 (17 years old): Scored six goals, including three in the semifinal win over France and two more in the finals victory against Sweden.
1962 (21): After scoring in Brazil's opening game, he was injured in the next match and didn't play again. Brazil went on to win the World Cup.
1966 (25): Brazil was eliminated in three games, with Pelé vowing never to play in another World Cup after getting brutalized by Portugal.
1970 (29): Brazil beat Italy 4-1 in the final, with Pelé scoring the game's first goal, his fourth of the tournament, and adding two assists.
Maradona
1982 (21): Argentina lost to Brazil in the second round, with Maradona scoring twice in five matches.
1986 (25): Led Argentina to the title, scoring five goals (including this epic against England) and adding five assists.
1990 (29): Argentina reached the final, losing 1-0 to Germany, with Maradona held scoreless in the tournament.
1994 (33): Played two games, scoring one goal, before being sent home for failing a doping test. Argentina lost in the round of 16.
Johan Cruyff
1974 (27): Named the player of the tournament after leading the Netherlands to a second-place finish.
(Cruyff helped the Netherlands qualify for the 1978 World Cup, but retired from international soccer in October 1977.)
Pelé played 21 seasons of top-level soccer. Maradona played 21 too, while Cruyff played 20. Messi is in his sixth top-flight season. Anointing Messi one of the best of all time is not unlike calling a rock band the best ever after just one album, a painter a master after a handful of sketches, or an actor his generation's finest after starring in a sitcom.
Unlikely as it would seem now, it's not inconceivable that Messi will eventually flame out, the way Ronaldo (the original one) did after a prolific start to his career. Ronaldo was once a shoo-in for the "greatest of all time" debate too, mind you.
Messi's international résumé is thin. Maradona went to four World Cups and won one. Pelé went to four and won three. The only one Messi could conceivably match at this stage is Cruyff, who played in just one World Cup, in 1974, but led the Netherlands to the final.
While it has also been pointed out that Messi has won far more than Maradona had at his age (or indeed Cruyff, although not Pelé), such comparisons are unfair. Messi rolled into a superb Barcelona team that has only gotten better during his tenure -- this, admittedly, had a lot to do with his own presence. Maradona on the other hand frequently found himself carrying the teams he played for almost single-handedly.
Nevertheless, a poll on Guardian.co.uk put the question to the readership. Is Messi better than Maradona? 56.2 percent said yes.
"Messi is so good that comparisons with other players currently playing football are simply not valid," 1978 Argentinean World Cup winner and longtime Maradona teammate Ossie Ardiles recently told Reuters. "So in that sense it is right that people are comparing him with the greats of the past, like (Diego) Maradona, Pelé and (Johan) Cruyff."
But, added, Ardiles: "He's still only 22 and you have to maintain this level for many years to earn the right to be considered better than these giants."
Is the notion that Messi is on his way to being an all-time great really so preposterous? No. The potential is there. And that's all that can conclusively be said for now. Let's reexamine this in a decade. Or at least wait until July 12.
