Agree with most of those. I think the Portuguese keeper needs to replace Buffon and Nainggolan from Belgium? I'm sure there must have been a better defensive midfield option? Interesting to look from an Italian perspective.
It's a mixture of both. I try not to go fully into the Hull vernacular, as I know I'll start putting it in my journo writing without realising at first.
Bobby Charlton said the greatest player he ever saw was Di Stefano. Eusebio was a great player, and a great person, but .I wouldn't rate him above Pele, Cruyff, Maradona, Di Stefano, Puskas. Or John Charles.
John Charles is strangely overlooked here. Is it cos he hasnt got a glamorous name, or he won nothing internationally, or he won nothing domestically? In a recent poll he was named the greatest foreign player to ever play in Italy, Maradona came second. He was also voted Juventus' best ever foreign player, Platini came second. Just think of that for a minute, it's incredible.
There again, it could be just poor use of English. Once tried the vernacular thing at school but the teacher wasn't having it and marked it down anyway. In those days you had to be more careful as they knocked off marks for poor English in history and geography exams. Unlike now where as long as they can get the gist it is OK. A friend of mine, a teacher, who was head of English,used to mark GCSE exams in the summer. They were told off for deducting marks for spelling errors unless it was an English language exam. This included the incorrect spelling of book titles and authors who were printed on top of the exam paper in English literature. They should have had 5 marks deducted for lack of observation and stupidity.
To be fair, I'm guessing the poll largely featured votes by the 11million Juve fans who live in Italy but still...
Well, I don't use it in formal stuff, because that would be stupid. I don't consider an internet forum to be formal, hence why I write in what I personally consider a more relaxed way. I agree on the mark deduction. If you're not going to take it seriously, they shouldn't take you seriously either.
Was taken to see John Charles as a very young kid when visiting my grandad in Leeds. Apparently he told me he was taking me to see the greatest player I would ever see. Unfortunately I don't remember it. Though I did see him when he came back to Leeds but he was past his prime by then. My dad always said that when he saw City play Leeds at BP he saw the two best players he ever saw in person, Raich Carter and John Charles, on the pitch at the same time. Can't think of any other player who would walk into any team at either centre half of centre forward. The only Juventus player who Torino fans admired after he spurned the sure fire chance to score as a Torino player was injured. A giant of a man who was never sent off or even booked. For anyone not familiar with John Charles this worth a read, especially for the comments about him by fellow professionals. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Charles
Once had a German teacher, a lunatic that you could write a book about, who considered certain errors to be heinous crime, and a personal insult to him and his teaching, and marked you down accordingly. Once got an exam paper back and had minus 28. That was good enough to place me 12thnout of 32.
Yashin was the Black Spider, wasn't he? I've also always referred to Eusebio as the Black Panther. What is it with nicknames being 'the black _________'?
Which is why Maradona can be rated higher than Pele, who never played outside his own country. Though when it was rumoured that Pele might move abroad the Brazilian parliament suspended unimportant things like discussing dam projects, the elimination if poverty etc to have him declared a national treasure which meant he couldn't be sold to a foreign company. As Jimmy Greaves said, to him you have to rate Maradona more highly. Napoli had won nothing, Maradona arrives and they win the league twice, the Italian Cup, the Cup Winners Cup. Maradona look leaves and nothing since, even a spell in Serie B. Even people not around at the time can reel off the names of many of the Brazil team of 1970 and even the one of 1958. But they can't do the same with the Argentina teams with Maradona in which won the World Cupnor the one he got to the final virtually single-handedly.
I was also at that match and agree they were giants in the game and are in my top 3 all-time favourite UK players together with Len Shackleton.
Yashin was also known as The Impregnable Spider. I guess it loses something in translation from the Russian. He was indeed known as the Black Panther and The Black Spider, but to most of us back in the sixties when they were playing Yashin was the Black Panther and Eusebio was the Black Pearl. As for the black thing that was because Yashin, uniquely at the time time, played in all black, and Eusebio was, well...black.
Oh, I know why they were called black, it just seemed like a very common template for nicknames. Allam probably wouldn't approve of such a common thing.
There ain't that many, really. The great Joe Louis was the Brown Bomber which would cause a meltdown amongst Afro-Americans and the PC mob here nowadays.
