Neymar - v2

[Reasonus]

This club vs. NT debate is not a very bright idea. A player is judged by his skills, intelligence, workrate, consistency, decisiveness, and other attributes. A player who has these attributes will have them regardless of where he is. The question of a team's achievement can't be boiled down to a single player in a team of 11+ players. Messi elevated Barcelona to the best team of all time, better than any other team that has played this game and that includes club and country. Barcelona is a superb team without him, no doubt, but so was Pele's Santos. So what differentiates a club from a country besides the fact that we can make more well-informed judgments from club games since they are played far more often in multiple competitions against all sorts of opponents compared to half a dozen WC games every four years? Who decides that national teams are bigger and more important than clubs?

The World Cup has absolutely nothing on the Champions League now from a sporting perspective, the hype is mostly political and financial and the fact that it's held every four years makes it somehow "more prestigious". I watched some games of the Europa League's knockout stages and they were more entertaining than anything I saw in the last WC.

Judging a player by their WC performances is unfair and ultimately not-so-smart.
You can play a maximum of 7 games in 4 years in a World Cup, and normally, a player can perform for no longer than 10 years at a high level. So a player can play 9 (fail to pass the GS) to 21 games (pass the SF) in 10 years if he plays in 3 WCs. How can you judge a player's talent and consistency from a dozen games in rather unfamiliar settings with little preparation? I know that many people use this as a measure of a player's talent, but I also know that many people have no clue about football.

 

[Puyol the wall]

This club vs. NT debate is not a very bright idea. A player is judged by his skills, intelligence, workrate, consistency, decisiveness, and other attributes. A player who has these attributes will have them regardless of where he is. The question of a team's achievement can't be boiled down to a single player in a team of 11+ players. Messi elevated Barcelona to the best team of all time, better than any other team that has played this game and that includes club and country. Barcelona is a superb team without him, no doubt, but so was Pele's Santos. So what differentiates a club from a country besides the fact that we can make more well-informed judgments from club games since they are played far more often in multiple competitions against all sorts of opponents compared to half a dozen WC games every four years? Who decides that national teams are bigger and more important than clubs?

The World Cup has absolutely nothing on the Champions League now from a sporting perspective, the hype is mostly political and financial and the fact that it's held every four years makes it somehow "more prestigious". I watched some games of the Europa League's knockout stages and they were more entertaining than anything I saw in the last WC.

Judging a player by their WC performances is unfair and ultimately not-so-smart.
You can play a maximum of 7 games in 4 years in a World Cup, and normally, a player can perform for no longer than 10 years at a high level. So a player can play 9 (fail to pass the GS) to 21 games (pass the SF) in 10 years if he plays in 3 WCs. How can you judge a player's talent and consistency from a dozen games in rather unfamiliar settings with little preparation? I know that many people use this as a measure of a player's talent, but I also know that many people have no clue about football.

Good post but team performance is important in judging a player too, like Maradona won the world cup when his team mates didn't offer that much support that is a great achievement but to judge a player by only the NT or club level is not right.Club football should be more important cause some great players didn't even get to play in the WC whereas all of them performed for club.But when awarding individual honors the voters are biased on team trophies when they should evaluate individual performances.

 

[Fourteen]

You refer to my comment ? Irrelevant yes, but douchy ?

No, no, no. Heavers.

 

[Ode to Django]

A middling Cypriot team made it to the KO stage in the CL this year. On the other hand that "dull" World Cup had some excellent football from Uruguay, Chile, Ghana and Japan. Take off your euro-blinders.

No doubt the highest quality is seen in the rich clubs. They have the money to buy whoever they want, so yes, nothing is going to stop Barcelona, Madrid, Man Utd, Bayern, and so on in brutal consistency.

But some players still play harder for country than club. Some, the other way around. Right now I agree the CL is going to have the best quality players every year.

But I don't know how anyone can complain about the 2010 world cup (which I loved, but to each their own) and then sing the praises of the CL. This years CL has been a dreadful show, some absolutely awful football.

x1000

I absoloutely loved the 2010 world cup very sad when it ended, bang on the money about the CL this year aswell it was god awful.

 

[BitByBit]

A middling Cypriot team made it to the KO stage in the CL this year. On the other hand that "dull" World Cup had some excellent football from Uruguay, Chile, Ghana and Japan. Take off your euro-blinders.

No doubt the highest quality is seen in the rich clubs. They have the money to buy whoever they want, so yes, nothing is going to stop Barcelona, Madrid, Man Utd, Bayern, and so on in brutal consistency.

But some players still play harder for country than club. Some, the other way around. Right now I agree the CL is going to have the best quality players every year.

But I don't know how anyone can complain about the 2010 world cup (which I loved, but to each their own) and then sing the praises of the CL. This years CL has been a dreadful show, some absolutely awful football.

Nippon , Uruguay . WC 2010 was awesome because of these two teams and Chile to an extent.

 

[barcelonista]

WC 2010 sucked mainly because of the Vuvuzelas. I'm rewatching some WC games recently and it's still unbearable. "Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz" throughout 90 minutes. DAFUQ?! Also Paraguay - Japan was the dullest football game ever played. EVER. FACT!

 

[barcelonista]

WC 2010 sucked mainly because of the Vuvuzelas. I'm rewatching some WC games recently and it's still unbearable. "Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz" throughout 90 minutes. DAFUQ?! Also Japan - Paraguay was the dullest football game ever played. EVER. FACT! Followed by Uruguay - Ghana, if it wasn't for the last minute Suarez drama.

 

[Reasonus]

WC 2010 sucked mainly because of the Vuvuzelas. I'm rewatching some WC games recently and it's still unbearable. "Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz" throughout 90 minutes. DAFUQ?! Also Paraguay - Japan was the dullest football game ever played. EVER. FACT!

Wasn't that the game that was played entirely in the midfield? And yes, the Vuvuzelas were very annoying. What about the Jabulani ball? I didn't enjoy a single game in that tournament.

 

[MagIX]

Those people kept quiet for a while, but reappeared after Messi missed the penalty against Chelsea. And they are the same people who say that Messi is only good thanks to Xavi and Iniesta, but are not capable to see that what makes Leo special are not his goals, but his playmaking abilities.

 

[Myrmecophile]

Spain's Best player in the WC was Iniesta... he was phenomenal through-out.

It was Villa.

 

[VivaBarca]

Villa was unquestionably Spain's best player at the World Cup.

 

[DennyCrane]

This club vs. NT debate is not a very bright idea. A player is judged by his skills, intelligence, workrate, consistency, decisiveness, and other attributes. A player who has these attributes will have them regardless of where he is. The question of a team's achievement can't be boiled down to a single player in a team of 11+ players. Messi elevated Barcelona to the best team of all time, better than any other team that has played this game and that includes club and country. Barcelona is a superb team without him, no doubt, but so was Pele's Santos. So what differentiates a club from a country besides the fact that we can make more well-informed judgments from club games since they are played far more often in multiple competitions against all sorts of opponents compared to half a dozen WC games every four years? Who decides that national teams are bigger and more important than clubs?

The World Cup has absolutely nothing on the Champions League now from a sporting perspective, the hype is mostly political and financial and the fact that it's held every four years makes it somehow "more prestigious". I watched some games of the Europa League's knockout stages and they were more entertaining than anything I saw in the last WC.

Judging a player by their WC performances is unfair and ultimately not-so-smart.
You can play a maximum of 7 games in 4 years in a World Cup, and normally, a player can perform for no longer than 10 years at a high level. So a player can play 9 (fail to pass the GS) to 21 games (pass the SF) in 10 years if he plays in 3 WCs. How can you judge a player's talent and consistency from a dozen games in rather unfamiliar settings with little preparation? I know that many people use this as a measure of a player's talent, but I also know that many people have no clue about football.

Great post. Agree with pretty much everything.

Club performance is more important than NT performance simply because the array of games taken into observation is much broader. The more games one takes into consideration the more precise the observations are; denying that would be denying the laws of probability. Its simple logic.
Judging a player by NT achievements is selective perception - with a purpose. It's widely used as a dummy argument to downplay a players reputation and achievements on club-level, e.g. Messis., in a football discussion. I don't take that as a serious argument anymore.

 

[heaver]

guy gets his eye, but still he really like dat grass, he might be resting from running so much =P
and by then they already stopped playing, even though they scored one more... Neymar was afraid of getting seriously beat up after this rainbow lol you can see how he doesnt follow up.

 

[DennyCrane]

guy gets his eye, but still he really like dat grass, he might be resting from running so much =P
and by then they already stopped playing, even though they scored one more... Neymar was afraid of getting seriously beat up after this rainbow lol you can see how he doesnt follow up.

Typical Neymar. Useless rainbow flick, immediately losing the ball and then whining like a little bitch. Also, very classy to humiliate a team that's 7-0 down at that moment. Really backs up everything I've said about him.

 

[Kerrybai]

Awful world cup in my opinion. Spain winning each game 1-0 wasnt very exciting. Argentina were poor, Brazil were poor, England and France were a shambles. Italy were poor, Portugal were poor and those horns were unbearable. The Euros seem to throw up more entertainment than the WC.

Anyways back to Neymar. Scored twice last night including a penalty in an 8-0 victory for Santos. His finishing is up there with the best ive seen but some of the defending from the opposition was comical, worse than 2nd division Spanish teams.