if u were brought up with manners u will not insult people.

and there is an adage in yoruba that a child that is not well brought up @ home will be trained from outside and that i ve done. u re silly.

segun OPC , this is a public forum and for your information you are just burning calories

exercising your anger and frustration on the keyboard, (i sincerely pity that keyboard )

i have something better to do with my time than to engage in war of words with strangers

over the internet and since you were brought up well i thought you should have known that already.

Any person that says maradona played with drugs in mexico 86 needs his head re-examined.

dayokanu:

Ronaldinho lacks extra vision?? I am not sure I understand you here

With respect to vision. . . . you're on the ball, theres two or three of your guys in support darting into the opposition din, you send the ball to which ever you think is in the best position.
Just about any player can pick out a pass but it takes the very special ones to pick out the pass.
I sincerely don't think Dinho has that ability - he's got the skills, the guile but he's a more of a showman and in the game of football, the showmen are hardly the deep-thinking, calculative types.

For me, i'll always use Xavi, Zidane, Riquelme as the benchmark for the greatest creative m/f'ders; they've got the skills but they're not flashy or showy - the game is in their heads - ever played blind chess
When these guys come to the party, they play like they have knowledge of every blade of grass on the pitch.

Ruudie,

You need to watch the exquisite pass to Guily to score the only goal of Barcelona vs Milan 1-0 at San Siro. Under pressure from Gattuso

I prefer Ronaldinho to the rest but Zidane is also a master-class , little dribble,lots of set-pass with greatest of Vision.

zidane is a masterclass.

Maradona of course.

dayokanu:

Ruudie,

You need to watch the exquisite pass to Guily to score the only goal of Barcelona vs Milan 1-0 at San Siro. Under pressure from Gattuso

you can't judge a player by 1 pass. . . . fine it was a beauty of pass, utterly brilliantly, neat flic but i can put my money on it that its probably something that the average brazilian kid knocking a football on the streets of rio can pull off in a similar situation. He's full of tricks and flics and excellent ball juggling skills, but when you watch a model play-maker you see the way he draws the game to himself - keeps the ball and spreads play; he's like the focal point out there on the field and everybody even the opposition "play him."

Well, lets see if Milan put him right there in the middle of the park, how he'll hold out!

off the 3 mentioned in the topic, i'd go with zidane but my all time fav is riquelme - for me he embodies everything it takes to be a complete creative midfielder!

Riquelme is so lazy and extremely slow. He strolls all over the field leisurely.

Zidane is king

zidane is KING [b][/b]INDEED.

dayokanu:

Riquelme is so lazy and extremely slow. He strolls all over the field leisurely.

Yeah true. . . .  but when the ball is at his feat, absolutely everybody - the spectators, refs, his team and the opposition play to his rythmn. . . . . .  there aren't many of such players in world football today!

Zidane

@ Dayo,

did you see the difference between a naturall-born creative m/f'der and one who is just trying to play the role

xabi said“I have played against Zidane when he was playing for Madrid and when he was playing for France at the last World Cup," Xabi told Goal.com, giving his first interview since signing on with the Galacticos. "He was just in a different class to everyone else; he was just amazing."

"He did the most difficult things and made them look so easy – that’s something great to watch and a pleasure to play against," continued Madrid's new midfielder. "He was just top class.

as 4 me maradona played with drugs so he his diqualified 4 dat reason i think it ronaldinho

i ve loads of respect for the godfather(zidane) but i ve to stick to my man whether good times or bad times RONALDINHO!!!!!!!! rocks!!!!!

I don`t think any good football follower will have problem answering this question.MARADONA is the best anytime, anyday anywhere.be it best playmaker or ss.those of u saying he was a ss hold it first,in is time there was no such role but if u still want to describe his role in his active days he was a creative md aka playmaker(pm).zidane was good bt u cannot compare him wt maradona.Check him out from 1979 u-21 world cup till when he left the scene u will know that indeed maradona is the best whether as pm,ss,or c-md.remember when he was unveil in ITALY, 70,000+ came to watch him this record was just broken by cr7,that tells u what he was then.
The problem most of us have is RECENCY FACTOR we could remember zz vividly,because he just exit the scene compare to maradona that left yrs ago.Again few pple that were around when maradona was playing did nt so much watch him no thanks for tech shortage,we only get to hear wat he did later or see clips.
Most of us re using his drug usage as a case against him,but think of this
-drugs do not make anyone play
-we are nt talking of xter
-zozzuo HEADBUTT will also count against him,

tony brian:

as 4 me maradona played with drugs so he his diqualified 4 dat reason i think it ronaldinho

How does cocaine help one in becoming a great player(playmaker) oya come and explain, bear in mind he took cocaine

and [b]not [/b]steroids or some performance enhancer

man jalether, just give up. its pretty obvious that the only player you have real knowledge of is maradona, who is clearly not the best playmaker ever.
as for the drug situation, i would agree that maradona in '86 was amazing pretty much regardless.

Zizou, Zizou, Zizou

by a mile Maradona and his name will not die.

Can the moderator add a poll to this thread?

Zizzou!

May be Lionel Messi should enter this debate?

Of the three mentioned, i'll choose Ronaldinho but talking about best play maker ever then i'll say Xavi.
What makes a good playmaker? Unparalled ball distribution and ability to dictate the tempo of the game. Watch how Xavi plays. Everything revolves around him. I call him the 'Puppet master'. He pulls every other person's string.
Ronaldinho's problem is that he gets too carried away with skills and could just turn a match into one of those 'Joga Bonito' sessions.

I would vote for the Boss, Zizou the Prince Himself!

In club footie he is unrivalled, winning 2 CL trophies with Juventus and Real Madrid and playing in two finals.
Won one WC, and played in the finals of another, same as Maradona. But Zizou stands tall, even taller than Maradona. That's why he's the all-time WPOTY, just edging Ronaldo Da Lima by virtue of being in 3rd place twice.

My only pain is that he never played for mes que un club. That would have more than cemented Barca as the greatest all time players farm.

Zidane didnt win CL in Juventus

Zidane is the greatest playmaker but maradona is the greatest PLAYER(zizou himself said it...........)

Having been a person who witnessed playing of all three players I think I can contribute greatly to the debate.

Maradona: Is Number 1
Played in time when defending was brutal , you can get tackled 3-4 times before a yellow was shown
also you could be tackled from behind. Which is why Maradona always glanced back while dribbling.

Maradona single headedly could dribble 6 players on his own an then have unselfishness to distribute a pass.
His technique for free kicks were exceptions only second to Zico. Zico has most number of goals where goal keeper does not moves.

He played in European cups it was just not called champion's league. But it was called something else.

Maradona played in Napoli , and Lead Argentina that had the worse generation as far as talent is concerned.

Playmaker extraordinaire, dribbling extraordinaire people would try to tackle just to hurt him and sometimes they could not touch him.

1 Youth World Cup , 1 World Cup win , 1 Runner's up World cup Victory, European Cup Glory with Napoli

The one "ASPECT" what stands out about Maradona is he played with strong or weak team did not matter he found a way to win

The only time he was with exception player was 1994 when Batistuta was in 1994 squad

Cristiano Ronaldo comes close to that invincibility specially when he took Portugal to Semi Finals last world cup

Zidane comes almost equal to Maradona

He was a player that during 1998 and 2002 was as dominant as Maradona was in his career , and this dominance showed in European cup 2000. No one could touch Zidane during that time. He was the only player that ever gave me a feeling someone existed who could not be touched after Maradona. He was built like a Tank while playing for Juventus and only got better playing Champion's League.

1 World cup , 1 World cup runners Up , 1 European Cup, Champions League Glory

However , Zidane played with "EXCEPTIONAL GENERATION PRODUCED BY FRANCE AND AFRICA COMBINED" mean while Maradona played with what ever bits and pieces players that were thrown together and called a team

The French Team of 1998 had TALENT LOADED .....

Youri Djorkaeff , Patrik Viera, Henry , Marcel Desailly, Lilian Thuram, David Trezeguet, Bixente Lizarazu


Ronaldinho , while as skilled and talented he was on ball (better in tricks and flicks then Maradona and Zidane)
He played in time when Tackles were not fully allowed (you can actually do tricks now in soccer)

1 World cup win 2002 - Youth World Cup , Coppa America

In 2006 Zidane outclassed Ronaldinho in world cup match (Zidane was playing end of career while Ronaldinho had 4-5 years more left in him.


Ronaldinho just did not had the "fire" in him he won things with no effort


RONALDO (BRAZIL) Is more closer to Zidane & Maradona in term of legendary status because he had that FIRE
which made him beat anyone

Messi is the greatest playmaker