I think the desperate one who run away when his club started losing ... and came back around the 2nd Milan game
Valdano do you mean i still defended Valdano because that never changed ...
Valdes club stature is the same as Iker ... i don't see any difference.. of course now in your hypocritical eyes Valdes is not as he is leaving like the rest of you but a keeper who was the main man for almost 10 years winning as much as he did and he is still not an icon in your eyes and calling me desperate
If Valdes is not an icon than neither is Pep , Cruyff and many more including Messi because Valdes was more instrumental in the entire era
Valdes is indeed an icon but not in the same way as Iker is at Madrid. Casillas had such a huge impact on Madrid from an early age. The manner in which he came on against Bayer Leverkusan and made countless saves to win you the Champions League instantly put him in the clubs folkore. Casillas was consistantly putting in world class performances from an early age and maintained this level for years. It was only a couple of years ago that he began to make mistakes but before that he didn't make any.
Valdes had to slowly build his reputation at Barcelona over the years and it is only recently that he is being fully appreciated by the whole footballing world. He never hit the heights that Casillas did and he has worked hard to improve as a goalkeeper over the years. He was always prone to the odd error in his early days and they have become much less frequent and it can be argued that he has been better than Casillas for the last year or so. Casillas reached his phenomenol peak at and early age and maintained it for roughly ten years while Valdes has been slowly improving thoughout his Barca career.
I also don't think Valdes ever had to consistently save Barcelona's asses the same way Casillas had to when Madrid were falling apart during the end of the Galacticos. He was making ridiculous saves that earned Madrid countless points. It can be argued that Valdes has been doing that for the last couple of months but Casillas was saving Madrid's asses on a weekly basis for a much longer period of time.
Valdes is most definitely a Barca legend and will go down as the clubs most successful goalkeeper. Casillas is on a different level in terms of iconic status though. Madrid have had their highs and lows over the last number of years and Iker has been there for all of it. Even when the team was a mess, Iker was phenomenal.
