are shorter people better at football

Many players like maradona, pele, messi are all short.

What I am saying is, why don't 6'8 people or something like that play just as good?

Limited mobility for the tall guys, i'm 6'6" and the only way I can cope with quick, small strikers is playing rough and using my length.

Short people are better suited for some key aspects in football, like dribbling and ball control. Just like tall people are better suited for basketball or volleyball.

Art Morte wrote:Short people are better suited for some key aspects in football, like dribbling and ball control. Just like tall people are better suited for basketball or volleyball.

yes.


too bad i played the wrong sport growing up. i couldve been world class...

There are more short people in the world, but never before has short people become this good in football the likes of Xavi & his nephews.

It is not a matter of being automatically better. It is about abusing your advantages and coping with your disadvantages.

Ibrahimovitch is a tall guy, yet moves with rare grace.

You can be tall and technical. Most tall guys nowadays are crap with their feet, though. The game has evolved to focus on the physical side, which means tall guys are huge, strong, fast, but total shit in other aspects of the game. It doesn't have to be that way.

What do you define by "tall", anyways? 180 - 190 I consider tall and you can find many technical players in this area.

but ibra used to be short.. thats why he has those skills

I guess it depends on where they play. Shorter people have it more difficult when playing as goal keepers...

rwo power wrote:I guess it depends on where they play. Shorter people have it more difficult when playing as goal keepers...

and yes of course as a CB's

Giggity5313 wrote:but ibra used to be short.. thats why he has those skills

lol,everybody used to be short

InvalidComment wrote:

Giggity5313 wrote:but ibra used to be short.. thats why he has those skills

lol,everybody used to be short

Shorter people have an advantage that they recieve for example a freekick much easier than tall people when going into challanges. Also shorter people seem to be alot quicker at changing directing, better agillity and balance then tall players like caroll or ibra which often can feel clumsy on the field.

The rules are defenitely an advantage to short people imo.. they can just go down on the ground easily when a big guy tries to take the ball and it looks brutal.

If Ibra was short he would be equal to messi imo

i think you mean attacking footballers, beacause size and strength is what make better CB's Goalies and depending on there role midfielders.....it is about balance and low center of gravity, they are more agile because they have less weight to shift, shorter legs allows them to keep the ball closer to there body while running at full pace because there strides are not as long.....being short and a attacker is an advantage....but it depends on the position you play, because a man like vidic is a better footballer in the sense of what his position is then a lot of average attack players

i'm 6'2 (188cm) and played CM my whole life...and goal keeper when i was younger as i was the only kid who could reach the cross bar lol

It depends, if you consider 1.70 short, then maybe. But truth is, that very short people is not suited for football. There are very few professional players under 1.68cm. In la liga, probably only Pablo Piati.

So I think that while being short has some advantadges, it can also be a disadvantadge.

On the other side, it is very rare to find skilled attacking players over 1.88.

Well, I just checked - Philipp Lahm is 1.70m - I always thought he was smaller. But then, it's probably because one sees him often next to Manuel Neuer when the camera pans over the German team in international matches

Lets see:

Average: 180
Short: 170
Big: 190

Ibra 195
van Basten 188
Cruyff 180
Ronaldo 183
Cristiano 186
Shevchenko 183
Henry 188
Zidane 185
Rivaldo 186
Figo 180
Ronaldinho 182
Batistuta 185
Džeko 193
Gomez 189
Llorente 195
Trezeguet 190
Ballack 189
Lampard 184
Gerrard 183
Vieri 186
etc etc...

im 173..

Im to quick and agile for my defenders ..

ADVANTAGE...

But you lose out in physical battles and 1v1 running shoulder to shoulder.

yeah, but you can just turn though

both of the ronaldos are above 180cm and they have great technical abilities as does ibrahimovic, ronaldinho, di maria etc.... technical skill has nothing to do with height. the only difference is that smaller people have a lower center of gravity which makes them more agile than their taller counterparts.

Idrisozet wrote:There are more short people in the world, but never before has short people become this good in football the likes of Xavi & his nephews.

yes, xavi is better than Maradona and pele. Get a grip. SCholes.

Another thing people overlook is the fact that there are far more people under 6 ft than there are way over is. So out of hundreds of 5 ft 7 footballers a few are bound to be exceptional whereas out of a handful of pro footballers who are 6"6 + the chances are slim.

Obviously smaller people are better at skills etc but being a target man can be just as good for the team.

You can put 50 midgets in a team and hope they play like Barca, but they won't. It's all about the style, training and education.

Any large player can be very technical if they train that part of their game. ChocaVille made a nice list.

It's just nowadays most big dudes completely focus on their physical side and end up headless chickens.

180 cm isn't the average size, anyways... at least not in the Americas and some parts of Europe. Definitely not in Asia.

Well, in Germany around 1.80m it is for the guys

Interesting stats: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Average_height