That's the point here mate. Defenders, whoever they were Maldini, Baresi or others, were allowed to do more to stop attackers hence less goals. Refs more lenient as would come under less scrutiny from journalists and fans who didn't have access to photographic evidence of their mistakes.
I think its a bit of a myth that defenders got a away with alot more. They did a bit but not as much as people think. Refs constantly blew their whistle back in the day. It was actually a more stop start game back then and even more so before that.Ronaldo was scoring over 30 goals a season in serie a at the time because he was better and fitter than other strikers at the time. He was a modern player in that day whereas the guys who weren't scoring record amounts would need to be alot fitter and more professional to do it and especially in todays game to be real top players.
I think its a bit of a myth that defenders got a away with alot more. They did a bit but not as much as people think. Refs constantly blew their whistle back in the day. It was actually a more stop start game back then and even more so before that.Ronaldo was scoring over 30 goals a season in serie a at the time because he was better and fitter than other strikers at the time. He was a modern player in that day whereas the guys who weren't scoring record amounts would need to be alot fitter and more professional to do it and especially in todays game to be real top players.
I think its a bit of a myth that defenders got a away with alot more. They did a bit but not as much as people think. Refs constantly blew their whistle back in the day. It was actually a more stop start game back then and even more so before that.
Loving this thread It's like someone with 1 leg (that will be Barcelona as they are a bit disabled right now) laughing at Usian Bolt all year (Mbappe as he's tipped to be the next big thing) and when it comes to an actual race, which is what happened yesterday peg legs can't understand how they lost
Well I did say almost. But that was just bad refereeing and I don't think tackles like that were being committed on Ronaldo every game. Messi used to get some pretty bad tackles that weren't punished
Well I did say almost. But that was just bad refereeing and I don't think tackles like that were being committed on Ronaldo every game. Messi used to also get some pretty bad tackles that weren't punished
Probably not even most games, no. But it does say something about the standard IMO as refs later on would never hestitate to send the guy off. This was a Milan derby and not sure how far in, but provided score was 3-0 in Milan favour, ref really has no excuse (only excuses to this day with these sorts of tackles is that refs hesitate to kill the game with a decision).
My suspicion (and unfortunately without extensive video evidence from pre-2000 we cannot verify it) is that the likelihood of this being a standard is fairly high, because of how society used to be. Men were men etc. Defenders, defensive mids and even wide midfielders who didn't play as far up as they do now, used to famously be fairly hard men and you had to 'put up with it' and not get intimidated by out of line tackles like this if you wanted to be a successful forward. I mean who is going to check every one of these? Especially in Serie A where Juventus bought themselves every other title back then.
Lots of fouls which are now yellows back then would at most get a whistle. Lots of fouls which are now whistled, would back then not get called i.e. some shirt pulls and tussles, because it was put down to what happens in a duel between two players. If you got an elbow to the ribs, you played on. Tough times for CFs, particularly in Italy or France.
Pretty sure some time ago I'd posted this - goals per team (since different leagues had 18 or 20 at different times) have only been poorer for Italy and France between 95-2007- 42.1 and 42.9 compared to 48-52 in other 3 of the big5. La Liga also had the most trigger happy refs back in the day, Italy not far behind.
All in all defenders weren't necessarily better. Rules were different therefore difficult to really compare. The game has been changing for the benefit of the TV viewer to have more goals in across the board, whether it means keeping ridiculous handball rules or actually punishing dickwad tackling. It's not about the battle anymore, but actually being more fair.
Messi did also get these tackles especially pre-Twitter when this would go up online and TV network/journalist could get an instant high quality replay showing ref has fucked up.
It's like someone with 1 leg (that will be Barcelona as they are a bit disabled right now) laughing at Usian Bolt all year (Mbappe as he's tipped to be the next big thing) and when it comes to an actual race, which is what happened yesterday peg legs can't understand how they lost 
