Diego MARADONA | 1984-1986, 1988-1990, 1993 - 1994

[Brezza]

Nicknames: "El Diez" | "Pelusa" | "El Diego" | "El Pibe de Oro"

Club: SSC Napoli



Growth type: Early/Lasting








1988-1990

Club: SSC Napoli










1994

Club: Newell's Old Boys








INFO:

Spoiler: show

Diego Armando Maradona is regarded by many as the greatest player in the history of the game. He was a complete master of the ball who used his talent and flair and incredible speed. He could beat defenders, he could score, he could distribute the ball... His versatile skills made him unpredictable and very dangerous. Maradona had a compact physique and could withstand physical pressure well. His strong legs and low center of gravity gave him an advantage in short sprints. His physical strengths were illustrated by his two goals against Belgium in the 1986 World Cup. Maradona was a strategist , as well as highly technical with the ball. He could manage himself effectively in limited spaces, and would attract defenders only to quickly dash out of the melee (as in the second 1986 goal against England), or give an assist to a free teammate. Being short, but strong, he could hold the ball long enough with a defender on his back to wait for a teammate making a run or to find a gap for a quick shot.

One of Maradona's trademark moves was dribbling full-speed on the left wing, and on reaching the opponent's goal line, delivering lethally accurate passes to his teammates. Another trademark was the Rabona, a reverse-cross pass shot behind the leg that holds all the weight. This maneuver led to several assists, such as the powerful cross for Ramón Díaz's header in the 1980 friendly against Switzerland. He was also a dangerous free kick taker.

He was born on October 30th 1960 in Lanus outside Buenos Aires. There he played for Los Cebollitos (The little onions), before he joined Argentinos Juniors. At 16 he was Argentina's youngest-ever international when he played against Hungary. Two years later he captained the World Youth Cup winners and was soon transferred to Boca Juniors for £1.000.000. The success continued and he was voted South American Player Of The Year in 1979 and 1980.

In 1982 Maradona joined Spanish giants Barcelona for a world record transfer fee of £5.000.000. The same year the World Cup was held in Spain and Maradona made his World Cup debut on his new homeground Estadio Nou Camp. The tournament didn't end as Maradona had hoped and he was sent off against Brazil in the second phase, as Argentina bowed out.

In his first season for "Barca" he helped them win the league, leaguecup and the Super Cup. Two years later, another world record fee of £6.900.000 took him to success-starved Napoli, and in 1987 they won a league and cup double. A year earlier he had captained Argentina to a second World Cup triumph. It was a World Cup that forever will be synonymous with Maradona. He scored 5 goals in that tournament, including two against England. Both are among the most controversal in World Cup history. The first was the infamous "Hand of God" and the second probably the greatest goal ever scored in a World Cup game, as he ran from his own half showing magic displays and leaving seven English players for dead.

Success continued with Napoli as he again steered them to a leaguetitle and in 1989 even a triumph in the UEFA cup. In 1990 the World Cup was held in Italy and Maradona captained Argentina to yet another final. The Germans were once again the opponents and this time they proved too strong for the Argentinians. That loss was to be the beginning of the end for Maradona. Two drug scandals have created black spots on his name and reputation. Several come-backs have been tried since 1991 and after helping Argentina qualifying for the 1994 World Cup in USA, Maradona looked fit for fight again. A marvellous goal against Greece in the first match gave proves for that.

But in the next game against Nigeria he was caught for drug abuse, and the World Cup story of Diego Armando Maradona got a sad ending. That match meant that Maradona equalled the record of matches played in the World Cup of 21, held by Uwe Seeler and Wladislav Zmuda (Later beaten by Lothar Matthäus). Maradona retired from international football after that with a gallery of good and bad memories. But he is by neutral football lovers regarded alongside Pelé as the greatest player of them all.

HONOURS:

Spoiler: show

Club
Boca Juniors
Primera División: 1981
Barcelona
Copa del Rey: 1983
Copa de la Liga: 1983
Spanish Super Cup: 1983
Napoli
Serie A: 1987, 1990
Coppa Italia: 1987
UEFA Cup: 1989
Italian Super Cup: 1990

Country
FIFA World Youth Championship: 1979
FIFA World Cup 1986
Artemio Franchi Trophy: 1993
75th anniversary FIFA Cup: 1979

Individual
Golden Ball for Best Player of the FIFA U-20 World Cup: 1979
Argentine league Top Scorer: 1979, 1980, 1981
Argentine Football Writers' Footballer of the Year: 1979, 1980, 1981, 1986
South American Footballer of the Year (El Mundo, Caracas):1979, 1986, 1989, 1990, 1992
Italian Guerin d'Oro: 1985
Argentine Sports Writers' Sportsman of the Year: 1986
Golden Ball for Best Player of the FIFA World Cup: 1986
Best Footballer in the World Onze d'Or: 1986, 1987
World Player of the Year (World Soccer Magazine): 1986
Capocannoniere (Serie A top scorer): 1987-88
Golden Ball for services to football (France Football): 1996
Argentine Sports Writers' Sportsman of the Century: 1999
"FIFA best football player of the century", people's choice: 2000
"FIFA Goal of the Century" (1986 (2–1) v. England; second goal): 2002
Argentine Senate "Domingo Faustino Sarmiento" recognition for lifetime achievement: 2005

VIDEOS:

*Dribbling*

Spoiler: show

*Passing*

Spoiler: show

*Free Kicks*

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*Goals*

Spoiler: show

ADDITIONAL LINKS:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diego_Maradona

http://www.diegomaradona.com/ingles/ihistoria.html

http://www.fifa.com/classicfootball/pla ... index.html

http://www.planetworldcup.com/LEGENDS/maradona.html

[SirRustallot]

I really appreciate the debates here. I don't come across discussions on Maradona focusing on his playing abilities as often as I want. With that said, I still think that fairly major modifications to his stats are needed. I'm basing this on having watched the one hundred or so, very rare, 3-5 minute videos from these two users at YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=search_videos&search_query=disagol&search_sort=relevance&search_category=0&page=

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=kei16662&search_type=&aq=f

I'm aware that all forms of highlights are misleading in some way but considering the overall length, and the fact that the creators of these videos are not as intent on always portraying him in the best possibe light, thus giving us a more rounded view of him, these are the next best things to watching full matches of him I think.

Anyway, what I object to the most are the evaluations on his response, strength, tenacity and teamwork. I'm surprised at how underrated he was at these, particularly because, in terms of strength and tenacity, he has few, if any, rivals. I also disagree with the evaluation of his passing, and would say the same thing as what I said regarding his strength and tenacity. Nobody ever was as creative as he was at this aspect, and only a few (Platini and Zico come to mind) are as, or more, accurate as him.

I can't recommend enough a complete viewing of the videos I linked to (particularly because I have no idea about how to even start writing a detailed rebuttal ). For a start though, here are videos specifically highlighting his passing ability, his most overlooked skill (note though that there are a ton of other footages of this skill of his strewn all across the other videos)

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_t ... ry=0&page=

I'm going to throw these others highlights as well :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WGr3JtKhUA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hHhaHSaTlQ (first of five parts)
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=search_videos&search_query=fishtsingtao&search_sort=relevance&search_category=0&page=


***

To me Maradona do not deserve 99 in TEC.

I watched videos about Zidane and Maradona. I'm amazed how well Zidane's feet touch the ball. There's the kind of sweet love between the ball and Zidane's feet.

Maybe because of the oldiness of Maradona's videos, I can't feel the same alchemy between feet and ball. He was a great dribbler, touched very often the ball when dribbling, he was amazingly fast with the ball. But sometimes, when he controlled the ball, you can see that it went a little too far.

You have the impression that the ball don't stick his feet as much as Zidane's (or Bergkamp).

[youtube]http://uk.youtube.com/v/Ah8xBnjtYWw&feature=related[/youtube]

Well, I think he deserves full marks for it. I really believe his dribbling style was by choice, not because he sometimes lets the ball go a little too far. His style was to get past defenders with the least amount of touches. And the results were sublime, whether he was running at full speed or starting from a stationary position. He wasn't a player like Messi, who never let's the ball go past a yard from his left foot and who's constantly adjusting it as he goes. What should be focused on with regards to his dribbling ability, I think, is the way the ball often seems to have a certain heaviness to it when watching him steer it through a mass of defenders. The ball never seems out of control. This control of the ball can also be seen in the improvised-on-the-spot passes that he makes (often, in one touch), his first touch to bring the ball under control, or the tricks that he so very rarely does and repeats (again, I believe by choice). I really believe he's the best technical player to ever play the game. Here are a few snippets of his dribbling ability and technique. There are far more of them where they came from.







***


Here's a statistic that may interest the posters here. Maradona, purportedly, had over 300 assists in his club career and 47 assists in his national team. I was a frequent visitor to http://www.soccerpulse.com before it met its end because of site hosting costs (although it's reviving again now), which is where I got it from. I wish I could link to the post as it is quite detailed, as well as to all the other posts the author (Vegan) made about Maradona as he's extremely knowledgeable about his career. Unfortunately, I can't.

[Plava Čigra]

This thread will be locked, because many people claim that, with these stats, he looks very realistic in PES. I will unlock it only if somebody presents a strong arguments for that.

[Brezza]

I’m unlocking this thread after a Pm convo with Rfuna. I would like some more opinions.

Looking at agility it could be a case where its overrated (hard to believe for a 99 figure I know )

The main comparison here should be with Messi who is the most agile player of our generation. They both use the Gambetta dribbling style (shimmy to put defenders of balance then a sudden burst of speed with immense close control)
Now when Maradona wanted to use this dribbling technique to beat defenders he was just as effective as Messi if not better, but it could be argued that Messi uses his agility and constantly twists and turns more frequently during the match. On occasion Maradona was more of a dance and shield player than Messi was using his strength to beat players more often.

My argument to this was that the shielding aspect of the game was probably down to the rough-house old school style man-marking defending at the time, seeing as modern day footballers get far more protection. I’m not sure if this can be represented in the current Pes games however.

I also believe that Messi beats players at a slightly quicker pace so I think that Both top speed and dribble speed that need to be re-evaluated for Diego. Nothing severe but a 1-2 point change here or there.

Balanced could be raised. Maradona was a player who could withstand pressure from 3 to 4 defenders, many several times taller and heavier than Maradona. Not just able to stay on his feet from hard tackles but he was literally about to hold them of at will and shield the ball superbly, it was terribly difficult to bring him down

WFF and WFA could be the same as Messi

Aggression could be lowered to represent the playmaker aspect of his game. he wasn’t always as direct as Messi or Ronaldo in an attacking third and like to drop deep and play a number 10, I think a mid-high 80’s would compensate for this and his attacking runs on the ball

Attack could be lowered to Messi or Ronaldo’s level. Although his attacking intelligence was impressive he was not the sort of player to position himself in the box and was by no means a poacher he always used to run at defenders more so than using his positional sense. His sharpness and reading of the game is well represented with 88 response

Teamwork has been discussed for pages on end. It does look low for him but it was tested and given that value order to make him a bit more lifelike and do those constant solo runs off his. With his passing values and talisman+ Passer low 80's it just made the him pass too much under A.I control. However some testing could be done to see how he reacts with higher teamwork and the removal of talisman/passer

Also I silently dropped shot power 2 points when the thread was locked

[zguc]

Brezza I agree with you as far as ATT, AGG an TW but I think that Diego deserves absolute maximum agility. It should remain 99

[Rfuna]

Fucking fantastic Lets keep it neat and simple folks and hopefully we can knockout an update in a week or so.

About Agility, I think it's important we take his weight into account. We don't want him slaloming through 3/4 defenders cartoonishly. Similar dribbling style or not, he was definitely more physical than Messi, having to rely on his body strength rather than just 'slipping' through.

About Speed, I can't help but think he has better pace than Messi. I need to watch more games/highlights and take note of who is running past, but on top of my head, I was say ACC @ 89-92 and TS @ 90-92. There shouldn't be that big of a difference between both values IMO. TS I think ought be lower than Messi, a high orange number I think will do nicely, but it's hard to rate as he's always stopping and turning

Attack @ 8687
BB @ 87

I'm all for the removal of playmaking* and instead a higher TW.

Nicely done with the slight lowering of SP.

[Luisao82]

Maradona apsolutly deserved agility 99 because he is been a FAT, fast and veri agility messi is 0 for him maradona is best f player ever ashole

What a lovely comment.

[bssm]

He isn't more agile then Messi.

[besthunter]

Pretty sure messi is more agile... not by alot, maybe maradona had a rivaling agility to messi, but he didn't display it as obviously and consistently as messi. Their styles were smiliar... but I think it's pretty clear from watching the two that messi focuses on quick movements and sharp turns alot more than maradona

[donandresiniesta]

Pretty sure messi is more agile... not by alot, maybe maradona had a rivaling agility to messi, but he didn't display it as obviously and consistently as messi. Their styles were smiliar... but I think it's pretty clear from watching the two that messi focuses on quick movements and sharp turns alot more than maradona

Disagree here, Messi switch directions while dribbling at a fast speed, although not running at fast speed, ..., Maradona however, can move the ball, control the ball, in any single way he likes, and relies even more heavily than Messi on keeping his balance, and is able to change directions, beat defenders, faster than Messi, who uses more sudden acceleration bursts...

[Luisao82]

Disagree here, Messi switch directions while dribbling at a fast speed, although not running at fast speed, ..., Maradona however, can move the ball, control the ball, in any single way he likes, and relies even more heavily than Messi on keeping his balance, and is able to change directions, beat defenders, faster than Messi, who uses more sudden acceleration bursts...

Not necessarily that he could beat defenders FASTER than Messi, but he could do it a bit more expertly/skilfully than Messi... that's why he has 99 in DA.

But there's only 1 pt gap between the two in terms of Agility, so by now I think we should keep it that way. Let Messi prove himself a little bit more to deserve to be on par with Maradona... which I believe will happen.

[zguc]

Yes I agree, that it should remain 99, believes his dribbling, if not faster than Messi are certainly more accurate, stronger, more harmonious ...

[Rfuna]

Let me take one final stab at this 'agility' thing. Agility = how FAST or QUICK a player turns or moves. This is where Messi has the upperhand over Maradona because weave through a packed defence, quickly changing directions and then bursting away. Now Maradona was different. He had to use his body strength and balance and his supreme dribbling skills. His agility made him look graceful on the ball as he slalomed his way past. So while Messi was skillful and quick in his movements, Maradona was skillful and strong, but also clever. You only have to count the number of lunges from defenders Maradona has to leap over as he goes on his dribbling runs compared with Messi who moves so quick the defender rarely has time to react and lunge. IMO Maradona should have an orange value so that he is more 'interceptable' . I'm currently testing the following:

ACC @ 90
TS @ 90
DS @ 92
Agility @ 93 - kind of like Aguero, who is taller and heavier

So far so good

[besthunter]

Pretty sure messi is more agile... not by alot, maybe maradona had a rivaling agility to messi, but he didn't display it as obviously and consistently as messi. Their styles were smiliar... but I think it's pretty clear from watching the two that messi focuses on quick movements and sharp turns alot more than maradona

Disagree here, Messi switch directions while dribbling at a fast speed, although not running at fast speed, ..., Maradona however, can move the ball, control the ball, in any single way he likes, and relies even more heavily than Messi on keeping his balance, and is able to change directions, beat defenders, faster than Messi, who uses more sudden acceleration bursts...

Nope. Try post after you've taken your head out of maradona's ass.

[jeanclaude]

speed of passing? must be in orange also, 90-94 or more. he has 84 and 85... it's a joke? he is like many and many others with these current stats,surely underrated, don't you think? in final 1986 against germany he pass to burruchaga with eyes behind the head! so quickly. reverse cross and more. .... listen to me please!

[Boa Morchi]

It's quite an accurate set to me, there's some points we can discuss, and obviously, being Maradona who is in question, will never get to an agreement. It's like discussing religion...

The only thing i see really underrated is TW, I understand most times he preferred to do the individual play, but that was consecuence of his amazing skills...
He proved to be a great leader, in Napoli and in Argentina. Come on, Napoli was a rather poor team and he made it one of the best in Europe, an that is by constructing a good teamwork under his leadership on the field

So, IMO TW: 88

[Plava Čigra]

Try reading discussion on this and previous pages and then you'll understand why is his value for TW on 80. Also read Cruyff's and Pele's thread and you'll figure it out.

As far as can see Brezza and Rfuna are suggesting removing Passer and/or Playmaking (Talisman) star/card in order to test him with higher TW. It may work, but it needs a lot of testing.

***

And I really think his Agility should stay in red. For me he deserves high red value (97-99), it's all a question of how you understand Agility and how it will work when you apply it in PES.

[zguc]

I agree with TW, with all the individual qualities also worked for the team, a great proof of his accurate and timely passing.

[Boa Morchi]

Try reading discussion on this and previous pages and then you'll understand why is his value for TW on 80. Also read Cruyff's and Pele's thread and you'll figure it out.

As far as can see Brezza and Rfuna are suggesting removing Passer and/or Playmaking (Talisman) star/card in order to test him with higher TW. It may work, but it needs a lot of testing.

***

And I really think his Agility should stay in red. For me he deserves high red value (97-99), it's all a question of how you understand Agility and how it will work when you apply it in PES.

I read the discussion on previous pages and undestood the problem with AI so thanks!

Still seems unfair but well, we cant have a set for human playing & another to play against the computer

[Rubedo]

Also I silently dropped shot power 2 points when the thread was locked

And who the hell told you to do that?

Cruyff is on 83, I think you and me both know Maradona deserves higher SP than him.

That's what you get when you do things on your own.

[jeanclaude]

i think could be nice to create a young maradona 18-20 years old,he scores a lot of gol.