Polls tend to mean nothing, especially in the eyes of fans. Younger fans will scoff at the idea of a player who isn’t Messi or Ronaldo being voted as the best ever. Old fans will likely scoff that their own hero is not mentioned. Then, comes the club bias. As such, these polls and ideas tend to be nothing more than popularity contests, usually voted for on outlandish credentials and unimportant factors.
However, recently the Spanish Football Research Centre – the CIHEFE – produced some outstanding figures about La Liga players’ histories. In the end, they voted for Raul as the finest player in the history of the proud competition.
The program itself looked at various factors to try and determine the finest player in the history of the league. From 1928, they looked at every player and measured their worth in goals, assists and tackles. They even took away points from players, critiquing for things like goal concession and red cards.
Top of the Table
Raul sits at the top of the table, ahead of Cesar Rodriguez of Barcelona and Telmo Zarra of Athletic Bilbao. Messi and Ronaldo do not make the top three, surprisingly. Messi came fourth, whereas Ronald found himself as far back as 23rd. However, this still meant that Ronaldo was a head of a few stellar names in the business.
For example, he outstrips Spanish record goal scorer and Valencia hero David Villa. He also beats Xavi Hernandez, arguably the greatest midfielder ever, who sat a shocking 49th in the positions. Iker Casillas, the Spanish goalkeeping legend, was down in 62nd.
Now we have to be honest when we say that the rating system for this was, at best, shocking. The rating of Xavi purely on goals and assists leaves a lot to be desired – as does the level of Ronaldo on the list. Whilst never holders of a C. Ronaldo Fan Club, we’d imagine he would at least be in the Top Ten.
Besides, these kind of ratings usually mean that intelligent midfielders and defenders are left down the list. Viewing the game as something that should only be based around the power of goals is a silly endeavour.
We don’t agree with much of this list, but for your own amusement you can have a look at the whole rating of the list on Dream Team FC.
