I believe the top players of this modern era for me aren't as good as they where 10-20 years ago. In general i think football in professional quality terms it's not as good as it was. There's no one big factor for this. It's many factors.
This has been more and more noticeable in recent years. The premier league in terms of quality is clearly going downhill quite sharply yet an ordinary united side are still the second/third best in Europe. Let's face it the World Cup in quality terms was not good, most matches where very dull, conservative affairs (thank god for Germans)! It's true the 1990 world cup was boring as sin but that era of football didn't have a quarter of the issues we have now!
I do think they all evolve from the greed for money.
- Finances playing too big a part in football (For me the who transfer system is a mess an it's only going to explode!)
This leads to problems with:
- Too many games (UEFA Cup, FA Cup etc.. being completely devalued)
- Lack of competitiveness. If you want to win the league, you need to enter the billionaires arms race or just rack up ridiculous sums of debt. most teams these days just try to consolidate their current position.
- The Champions League big club monopoly
- Wages and transfer fees spiraling out of control. You thought Andy Carroll for 35 million was bad. I think Jordan Henderson, who's just a decent young player at Sunderland going for 20 million is beyond ridiculous!
Also.
- The mercenary player culture. Not just that players are only interested in getting paid, or they seem to jump ship as soon as a bigger club comes knocking with little loyalty. I mean that will always happen but most importantly just how many talented young players are ruined by clubs who buy players for narcissistic purposes and completely mistreat them!
- Lack of 'community' in football. elements such as ticket pricing through the roof in England especially. Supporters feeling like customers rather All these plastic Barca, Madrid and untied fans with no real connection with the big clubs, instead they just support them because it makes them look cool or feel accepted, they are happy to buy into hype without really understanding what football is all about.
There's many more issues which cause this. some i can't think of at the moment. Other elements again linked to society and things which are caused by the points i mentioned above.
I saw this video and it sums up modern football so well.
This Neymar, he's talented no doubt, but the next Pele? He's Robinho with a even more ridiculous haircut.
Watch the video, it starts with usual plastic, overused, commercial music, all overly dramatic with clips of him doing, well nothing. then when we finally get to the 'action' at 1:25 what do we see? a DIVE, yes a dive! The state of diving in football is something which really is out of control. It's so screwed up that cheating is becoming an accepted action in football. What's wrong with a player having balls to ride a challenge? or like i said above the increased pressure of money being too much of a factor in football with Billionaires demanding success and TV rights, prizes etc.. mean you have to do anything to win!
So many overhyped prima donnas out there at the moment! Who one season are the next Pele Maradona Bruce Lee then in the next are warming the bench and forgotten about (Sergio Canales anyone?)
This has been rather brief, i wanted to get deep into this, I'll expand on this later but wanted to open us this debate here
I know someone will come with an argument, players are more athletic than they where in the past. Problem being this has lead to a decline in technique levels. We are getting too many Moussa Sissoko's and not enough Juan Roman Riquelme's!