Sled dog players?

The Franchise wrote:

Gil trying to speak about great creative players. Wouldnt know a quality creative player if he walked up and slapped him in the mouth.

They have seen a decade worth of bus parking, all they know is bus parking. Anyone with a glimmer of talent looks like the second coming of Garrincha as they are used to functional water carriers and sled dog players like Essien, Oscar, Ramires and co.

Iniesta is better than any player in Chelsea history. Im sorry if you wasnt aware of this previously, but however bad you think he is...realise he is still on a level no Chelsea player has ever reached, or even been in the conversation to reach it.

A quote from SAF (but I'm sure certain people know better than him) BTW this is one of many of SAF gushing over Iniesta.

“I’m not obsessed with Messi, Iniesta is the danger. He’s fantastic. He makes the team work.

The way he finds passes, his movement and ability to create space is incredible. He’s so important for Barcelona.”

To some extent Iniesta is not as great as he once was but he's in his 30's and playing in a new system without a guy he's been playing next  to for most his life.

You can say Messi carries Iniesta (Messi carries everyone on Barcelona) and I Wouldn't argue with that but then you have the Spanish national team and there historic streak, the trophies and the style of play built totally around Xavi and Iniesta.

So I mean the guy is proven world class no matter what team he plays on.   There are so many overrated players, I really don't get the dig at Iniesta in his 30's.  Not to mention who's spot is he taking at Barcelona that should be playing in front of him?

This post smells (and I hate when people say this) of someone not watching Barca enough because Iniesta's effect on the team is actually more pronounced when he doesn't play as you can see the issues we have getting the ball from the back to the front and you can remember how effortlessly he does it.

busquets/iniesta/messi will never be criticised no matter how bad they play

I've criticised Busquets for years.

Talk about riding on coat tails, this guy is the #1 example of it. To think we traded away Yaya in his physical prime for Busquets is still mind boggling to me and in defense of Pep he even said it was probably one of his biggest mistakes as a manager.

The guy is the biggest guy on our team and the biggest Pu**y. Offers no threat in the air and get routinely beat on set pieces.

When teams park the bus against us they just don't even mark him and are able to clog the middle and triple mark Messi.

Not to mention he's a cheater and a scum bag.

Is that enough? Because I could go on for days. And yes I recognize he is a good player but IMO massively overrated. I think he would struggle in any system outside of Spain/Barcelona.

the best player for Spain in the championship runs was Xavi... the best player on Barca other than Messi was Xavi...  and i'm taking nothing away from Iniesta.  Xavi just made the teams function.  Nobody talks about these types until they're gone.  Once they're gone for a few years, footix fans look up assists and goals = he wasn't all that. Just watch.

Back on topic...  Iniesta is a legend and deservedly so.  Has he slowed down?  Sure.  Injury problems.  But i bet you that he can bring out a brilliant game when needed.  He still has it in him.  He just no longer consistently great.  That ended 2 years ago.

funny thread is funny - so Iniesta is shit the last 3years huh?

cant believe the disrespect on busquets either. dude, let me get started by saying yaya toure is not even the same type of player as busquets. toure makes runs off the ball and with it and generally plays much more energeticly
busquets makes one touch passes and positions himself yaya cant even dream of doing defensively. toure looks like a lost lamb defensively at times. busquets is one of the biggest reasons for spain and barcelonad success with his genius movement and passing, along with his positioning that usually stops counters before they even happen.
mou knew this and had busquets completly man marked. barca were very lucky against us and time and time again we broke away at their defense, they looked like elche for a period of time without his influence.

Hapless_Hans wrote:
One of the greatest players of all time, doesn't get nearly as much attention as he could merit, due to Messi.

That's true even in this thread named after him

This thread is about Iniesta smh.

harmonica you keep derailing with your Messi lunacy.

Where's the mods if you need them ffs.

Poor Ini, man can't even catch a lil spotlight in a GL thread. Personally find both players, Zizou and Ini, to be around the same level when it comes to skill on the ball. Other comparisons I would leave that to whoever.

Anyway, part of my favourite player list and someone who has been world class for a good while. A proper attacking midfielder in my honest opinion and would go down as a legend of the game who hung on to no ones coat tail and forged his own legacy.

He's still one of the best around and one of the best midfielders of all time. Not to mention one of the greatest big game players of all time.

Is there any debate over this?

Iniesta is useless so is busquet not to mention brainfart pique and seriously dani alves is even a defender. Alba ?yeah he is road runner nothing more! mascherano own goal machine, rakitic yeah he is jst janitor u know to clean mess created by MSN. What a shit team.BTW cant remmber which team won treble last year

Me neither

Pirloisjesus wrote:Iniesta is useless so is busquet not to mention brainfart pique and seriously dani alves is even a defender. Alba ?yeah he is road runner nothing more! mascherano own goal machine, rakitic yeah he is jst janitor u know to clean mess created by MSN. What a shit team.BTW cant remmber which team won treble last year

Good one lol

Iniesta was one of their best players in every KO stage lol, in fact the only time Messi was better was against Bayern.

Against PSG, City and Juventus he was better, also this crap about Xavi always better is nonsense. It's complete revionism at best, the only time Xavi was clearly better was 2010 the rest was pretty even with Xavi getting an edge in 2012 due to his fantastic final performance but Iniesta out performed him before that final as did Alonso.

Funny how easily people forget facts when agendas are involved.

Great Leader Sprucenuce wrote:Iniesta was one of their best players in every KO stage lol, in fact the only time Messi was better was against Bayern.

Here we go again.

It is a complete mystery to me how some of you can waste so much neuronal energy on bickering over Messi VS Iniesta VS Xavi - when all of them played together.

TOGETHER.

Take a day off, or a week, maybe a couple of months, and think about the meaning of that word.

CL KO 14-15 whoscored rating

Tie - Messi - Iniesta

R16 1 - 8.9 MoM - 7.55
R16 2 - 10 MoM - 7.34
QF 1 - 8.54 - 6.68
QF 2 - 7.9 - 8.0
SF 1 - 10 MoM - 7.73
SF 2 - 7.18 - 6.46
Final - 8.23 MoM - 7.23
Total - 8.68 4xMoM - 7.28 0xMoM

I think this casual Newcastle fan just proved the point of this thread.

Great info. Thnks for contributing harmonica.

Well somebody has to compensate the zero information posts, Hopeless_Hans.

Every thread leads to a comparision of two players. Why do people feel this need to compare. Rivarly is human nature, I get it but... camaaaan

They were both very important on the road to Barca's success throughout the years. They benefit from each other, they complement each other and that's all.

do you play chess harmonica?

Yes.

linetty wrote:Every thread leads to a comparision of two players. Why do people feel this need to compare. Rivarly is human nature, I get it but... camaaaan

They were both very important on the road to Barca's success throughout the years. They benefit from each other, they complement each other and that's all.

Yeah.

For some reason many posters can't deal with two things coexisting, it has to be either/or

Harmonica wrote:Yes.

So how is this then.

The Sicilian defense makes black statistically strong against e4 openings, while white still has the overall edge due to d4?

That more correct?