Don't think Ferdinand was even the full time United captain was he? I thought it was vidic/keane/giggs/Neville who were the club captains during his spell except maybe his last year? As for Gerrard. Please spurlock, Gerrard won games single handed but he was a terrible captain. His version of captaining was to get his teammates to pass the ball to him so he could shoot or play a hollywood ball and when his legs were going he basically just shouted and moaned out his team mates when they made mistakes.
Nah Woodgate was good over a couple of seasons but couldn't do it over a longer period because of his injuries. Can't count him in there mate. Ferdinand and Sol solid Campbell were the best English defenders in the PL period. Ferdinand had his defensive lapses but sorted that out. Campbell was just a man mountain. Those two for England were brilliantly in the Euros, just a shame the rest of the team were pants. Both could handle their strikers single handedly.
I think a good captain is a bit of a maverick at times...swashbuckler, grabs the game by the throat and chokes it...that's big tingz on a football pitch Bobby.
Nah a captains someone who organises and leads his team. They might be a maverick but they are someone who brings the team up when they are down. Gerrard basically just told everyone to **** off and give the ball to him and told everyone they were **** after mistakes, like he was perfect and never lost the ball. You could tell the players were terrified of him. Terry galvanised the team in ways Gerrard did not
The reality is Chelsea fans will love him, and rightly so. Other fans will dislike him, but that's how it goes. Similar to Gerrard at Liverpool and Giggs at Man Utd. Their own fans idolise them and others don't. Behind all that bullshit bias... Terry will go down as a great player and a Chelsea legend. He might have done some dodgy things off the pitch, but so what? Not every footballer is an angel, and let's be honest it would be pretty boring if they were. On this occasion I must show respect for Terry. Bias aside Liverpool have missed that quality of defender for years. Well done John, great career and you deserve all the accolades you'll get
Is this about who was best captain or best English centre half of the PL era? Not sure what strict parametres we're working to here but I'd offer both Garry Pallister and Rio Ferdinand as better centre halves. If you like your centre halves to be of an intelligent, quick, ball playing ilk that is.
All very good CBs. Rio and Campbell bit better than JT. JT better organiser, leader... Terry's distribution underrated.
Absolute bollox Bobby. Just because he wasn't the most vocal on the pitch doesn't mean he wasn't a great captain. He led by example, everyone that happened to be around Melwood and Anfield said he was such an influential captain. You can't simply look at how he was on the pitch and say whether he was a good captain or not. If you were to do that you could look at games like Istanbul, 3-0 down Gerrard scores, lifts the whole crowd and players and we go on to win. West Ham in the FA cup. We were out, Gerrard won the cup. Olympiakos we were going out of the CL and Gerrard stood tall and scored a wonder goal with seconds to go which put us through. He led by example, on and off the pitch. Now he's starting again by coaching the academy. That's a club legend right there.
Agreed there Now I can't say what he was like off the pitch as i don't really have the inside info on Liverpool, and i'm not denying he was an inspirational player in terms of his game changing moments and his work rate, i just don't see him as a leader thats all. He might lift the crowd with a moment of magic but for me he doesn't lift the players. Carragher was the real leader in that team. Essentially what you're saying is, we should make Ronaldo, Messi, Ibrahimovic, Hazard etc captains. Let's agree to disagree
I tend to agree with you on this, Afro Stan. He's been a good servant for both Chelsea and England, but the accolades and eulogising is going to be very painful, and overly excessive. What I will miss most about him is his excessive use of the word "obviously" in his interviews. Obviously.
