I think the weird thing about these lists isn't so much that the rankings are "wrong" but that there really isn't that much difference in talent/ability between top players. There are a pretty small number of truly special players in the world and beyond them there are a ton of really good players and what makes a difference is having a manager/football operation that can put some of those really good players together in the right way. Its like cooking, there aren't that many truly special or rare ingredients, its about having ingredients that go together well and a good recipe for combining them. Pep has a few really special players at his disposal but he's also the best chef in the business so he makes the rest of his ingredients look better than they really are.
Agree 100% on Haaland v. Mbappe.
Yeah, it's remarkable in soccer how frequently one player can look amazing on one team, with teammates and a coach that fits them well, and then get sold for a bag of money and then look like shite. And vice-versa, a player who looks mediocre for one team becoming a star on another team that is a better fit for them. It makes lists like this complicated and why I think they just default to putting players that are on the best teams on most of the list. The reality is there are players all over the world that could be capable of being very good players if put on a great team, but only a few of them will get a shot at doing that.
If you swapped Alvarez with like, Dominic Solanke, would Solanke be able to be on this list? I think there is a very good chance he could be--you could look at Callum Wilson as a similar example. And Alvarez would very much struggle to make the list if you stuck him on Bournemouth.
Agreed, and it's part of what makes these discussions interesting - what is the "best" player. Of course putting the ball in the net is the priority and the sexy thing, but everything you say about Haaland makes it unlikely that I would ever put him at #1. For a while I wasn't even sure if he made City better, because they had to change the way they played to take advantage of him.
Messi is another edge case - he essentially doesn't defend, but you really wouldn't want him getting yellows, making slide tackles, risking injury etc. - so again you have to have a squad of other elite players around him, to compensate.
"Best," to me, implies an all-rounder, someone capable of influencing the game in all facets. So I guess I'm partial to the Xavi, Modric, Gerrard etc. - the dominant central midfielders.
At the end of the day, the hardest thing in soccer is to reliably and consistently create chances and score goals. That's why those kind of players demand the highest transfer fees and wages. The players that can consistently do that are more valuable than the players who do other things extremely well. Maybe that isn't a fair way to evaluate things, but it seems to be the way the world of soccer operates.
If you look at Haaland's advanced metrics beyond just goal scoring (which he ranks extremely high in, obviously) you can see a player that has room for improvement, even playing for City. He is in just the 3rd percentile for passes attempted per 90 minutes, compared to all other forwards in Big 5 leagues. He's in the 17th percentile for progressive passes, 29th percentile for progressive carries, and 28th percentile for successful take-ons.
Compare that to Mbappe, who ranks in the 96th percentile for passes attempted, 96th for progressive passes, 99th for progressive carries and 96th for successful take-ons.
Or even compare him to Kane, a more true classic #9, Kane ranks in the 60th percentile in passes attempted, in the 95th percentile for progressive passes, 43 for progressive carries and 47th for successful take-ons. It's hard to believe slow-ass Harry Kane has better progressive dribbling stats that Haaland but he does.
