César Luis Menotti, 83 years old, has revolutionized Argentina with a comment. The excellent coach said that for him, the best footballer in history was the Brazilian Pelé. Neither Maradona nor Messi. “Pelé is the best of all, it was supernatural, it was impossible. Any game for Pelé was the world final. You played a training session and it was the world final”, commented the technical director of the albiceleste team that won the World Cup in 1978. Is he right?
“For me it was a pleasure to be on a court and see him. He did things you didn't understand. He liked to act as a goalkeeper and not use his hands, he used them as a Chilean, as a popcorn. Personally, I cannot put him in any comparison because he is far from everyone, absolutely far, ”added Menotti, who had shared a dressing room with Pelé in 1968 during the Argentine's brief stay in Brazil.
Pelé won three World Cups (1958, 1962 and 1970). He is the only great footballer who has achieved it. He was the first global player and took Brazil to the top of world football, developing a good career at Santos. But, precisely that can subtract a bit in the leadership of that ranking that Menotti does not doubt. Pelé was extraordinary with Brazil when football was for the national teams, but Messi was the best when he was for the clubs. The Leagues that Messi played in Spain and the Champions League are more powerful tournaments than the championships in Brazil and the Libertadores, although Leo has not had a World Cup, neither Di Stéfano nor Cruyff, all of them having been number one.
Menotti no longer has the great ascendancy that he had in his day and it takes a lot of courage for an Argentine to place a Brazilian ahead of two local idols in the world of football, but Valdano's great phrase has always ended up defining the best: "Messi is Maradona every day."
The times are incomparable. Neither Pelé's has anything to do with Diego's, nor Diego's with Leo's. On his day, each of the three was the best in the world, at the time. Making the effort to carry out a comparison between different periods of time is excessive to be able to have a minimally scientific basis. The thing with Pelé is from another world and it took place in a period of time as long as that of Messi. With Maradona everything was shorter, but surely more intense. But the title of best player in history should be given to Messi because he was the one who held it the longest, for the most games and against the most powerful rivals. They all added magic and spectacle, but Leo did it every day and in top-level football. Many were (we were) of the three: Pelé, Maradona and Messi, when football was (is) art.
