Soccer debate - Club vs. National Team

[Jacob_Gilliam]

I bet San Antonio could. But it is a bit of a different in basketball because even today 85 percent of the best players in the world come from the US.

[ThaSaltCracka]

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As it is, most of Hollands team play in Holland, and the same is true for Portugal.

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not even close to being true for portugal, carry on [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]meh it partially true, about 50% of their team plays in portugal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portuga..._football_team

Unless thats wrong.

[TalkingDonkey]

Let's do runner up vs. runner up.

Liverpool

Alvaro Areola – D – Spain
Steve Finnan – D – Ireland
Sami Hyypia – D – Finland
Daniel Agger – D – Denmark
John Arne Riise – D – Norway
Harry Kewell – M – Australia
Steven Gerrard – M – England
Fernando Torres – F – Spain
Fabio Aurelio – D – Brazil
Xabi Alonso – M – Spain
Peter Crouch – F – England
Jermaine Pennant – M – England
Craig Bellamy – F – Wales
Dirk Kuyt – F – Holland
Javier Mascherano – M – Argentina
Mohamed Sissoko – M – Mali
Jamie Carragher – D – England
Pepe Reina – GK – Spain
Paul Anderson – M – England
Gabriel Paletta - D - Argentina
Miki Roque – D – Spain
Adam Hammill – M - England
Lee Peltier – D – England
Craig Lindfield – F – England
Stephen Darby – D – England
David Martin – GK – England
Nabil El Zhar – F - Morocco
James Smith – D – England
Jack Hobbs – D - England
Emiliano Insua – D - Argentina
Scott Carson – GK - England
Djibril Cisse – F – France
Anthony Le Tallec – M – France
Sebastian Leto – M – Argentina
Lucas – M – Brazil
Nikolay Mihaylov – GK – Bulgaria
Andriy Voronin – F – Ukraine

France

Mickael Landreau – GK
Abou Diaby – M
Eric Abdial – D
Lassana Diarra – M
William Gallas – D
Claude Makelele – M
Florent Malouda – M
Jeremy Toulalan – M
Djibril Cisse – F
Sidney Govou – F
Samir Nasri – M
Bakari Sagna – D
Francois Clerc – D
Jimmy Briand – F
Lilian Thuram – D
Sebastien Frey – GK
Sebastien Squillaci – D
Alou Diarra – M
Karim Benzema – F
Julien Escude – D
Franck Ribery – F
Gregory Coupet – GK
Nicolas Anelka – F
Willy Sagnol – D
Phillipe Mexes – D
Gael Givet – D
Patrice Evra – D
Julien Rodriguez – D
Jean-Alain Boumsong – D
Rio Antonio Mavuba – M
Patrick Vieira – M
Mathieu Flamini – M
Julien Faubert – M
Sylvain Wiltord – F
Frederic Piquionne – F
Thierry Henry – F
David Trezeguet – F
Louis Saha – F

[ThaSaltCracka]

I think thats a bad comparion.

[legend42]

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Apparently that makes no sense.

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My point was that the reverse could be argued just as easily, and probably with more justification. You need to actually compare the rosters rather than just make a declaration like that.

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Use your brain, many club teams have the best players on all the top national team,

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And some national teams have the best players from the top club teams...

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and national teams usually have a couple weak spots, like defense and goalie for brazil and I guess offense for Italy.

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Don't Brazil's goalie and Italy's striker both start for AC Milan? I guess that eliminates them from being one of the top club teams, otherwise we'd have to conclude they have "weak spots".

And doesn't Spain's national team have the starting goalies for both Liverpool and Real Madrid (I'm assuming they're two of the "many" all-star club teams you referred to)? I'm sure there are other national teams with two goalies who both start for top club teams as well. Are there any club teams with two goalies on their roster who both start for top national teams?

If you want to argue chemistry and teamwork as reasons for the club teams being superior, I think that's a valid angle. But as far as pure talent is concerned, I don't think the numbers back up your declaration.

[tarheeljks]

talent is obviously necessary to win, but i think you underestimate the importance of chemistry

[gusmahler]

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If you want to argue chemistry and teamwork as reasons for the club teams being superior, I think that's a valid angle. But as far as pure talent is concerned, I don't think the numbers back up your declaration.

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As far as pure talent at each position, I'd pick Barcelona and Chelsea against any national team.

[assius]

The National team is the highest level a player can reach.

Most decent national sides assuming they are given a month or so preparation would beat most club sides.

Team work is important but not the end all. I recall the MLS all stars whooping Fulham 4-1. They are much worse than most national sides and probably played 2 days together!

If you look at the world club champion the last few years, it was Sao Paulo of Brasil. Compare their team sheet to Brasil! Brasil would thrash them yet they beat the best club in Europe.

Look at the Copa Libertadores. Who do you think is better, Boca Juniors or Argentina? Not even close!!! Argentina would slaughter them. Also the runner up was Cucuta of Colombia, again not even close to even the Colombian national side on paper.

[JaredL]

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The National team is the highest level a player can reach.

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I guess this is true most of the time but it's not really relevant. Just because players dream more of playing for their country than playing for their favorite club doesn't mean that the skill level of their country, or any other, is better than that of the club.

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Team work is important but not the end all. I recall the MLS all stars whooping Fulham 4-1. They are much worse than most national sides and probably played 2 days together!
If you look at the world club champion the last few years, it was Sao Paulo of Brasil. Compare their team sheet to Brasil! Brasil would thrash them yet they beat the best club in Europe.

Look at the Copa Libertadores. Who do you think is better, Boca Juniors or Argentina? Not even close!!! Argentina would slaughter them. Also the runner up was Cucuta of Colombia, again not even close to even the Colombian national side on paper.

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Note that all of the clubs you used in your examples are teams that are, relative to top clubs in the world, not very good. There is no team anywhere in the Americas that would be a favorite to make say the last 8 in the Champions League, probably not even get through the group stage. The reason for this, and the reason that IMO and that of some others, is that the top players from every American country except Mexico play for European clubs.

For South America especially comparing the national team to that country's top domestic club isn't at all valid. Let's look at the Copa America finalists. Each named 22 players in their squad. For Argentina a whopping 6 of the 22 players play in Argentina. 8 play in Spain, 4 play in Italy, 3 in England, and one in Portugal. For Brazil it's even more exaggerated. Only 3 players in the 22 player squad play in Brazil, and they have a combined 17 caps including this tournament. 4 play in Germany, 3 in England, 3 in Spain, 3 in Italy, 2 in France, 1 in each of Portugal, Ukraine, Russia and the Netherlands. Of the 11 starters for Argentina, two play in Argentina. For Brazil only one starter plays in Brazil. All 5 subs used in the match play in Europe.

Here was the representation in the starting 22, including subs in parenthesis, by country in which the players play domestically:
Spain: 6 (8)
Italy: 5
England: 4
Germany: 2 (3)
Argentina: 2
Brazil: 1
Ukraine: 1
Russia: 1
France: 0 (1)
Portugal: 0 (1)

So when you look at the two best national teams it is pretty clear that their best players play in Europe and not locally. The four biggest European leagues were better represented by the Argentina and Brazil national teams than the Argentine and Brazilian leagues.

Of course the best players play for some national team so my argument here doesn't necessarily mean that the club sides are better. The main reason for that IMO is that in addition to European clubs getting the top players from the powerhouse countries like Argentina and Brazil and of course the various countries in Europe, they have many of the top players from good but not great countries like Uruguay, Paraguay, Australia, and several African countries like Mali, Senegal, the Ivory Coast and Cameroon. In other words there are loads of top class players that are playing for top class clubs but not top class national sides. These players significantly tip the balance toward the top club teams being better.

I'm not perfectly sure it would work in my favor, but I think that if you compared the last say 25 years the best players that never played in a world cup finals with the best players that never played in the Champions League group stage or later you would have a much better left out of the World Cup team. This doesn't necessarily mean that the top club in the world is better than the best national team in the world, but I think it would be strong evidence that the 30 or so best clubs in the world are significantly stronger as a whole than the top 30 national sides.

[gusmahler]

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Team work is important but not the end all. I recall the MLS all stars whooping Fulham 4-1. They are much worse than most national sides and probably played 2 days together!

[/ QUOTE ]There's a world of difference between Fulham and Chelsea/Barcelona/Milan.