Dave Mattinson
During the World Cup (remember that?) we had to put up with a lot. But one of the worst things for me was the Sky advert which showed Eric Cantona, over and over, trying to appear significant and important but actually looking what he is: an overblown, overweight, pompous and over-rated ex-Manc! It got me thinking of all the over-rated players there have been over the years and how many of our players down the years have not been given due credit when compared with them.
I’ll start with the afore-mentioned Mr Cantona, up against our own Dennis Bergkamp.
Cantona is often called the best Man U player of all time and the Premier League’s greatest foreign player (don’t make me laugh, but we have had to put up with this rubbish for years). Where did this myth spring from? Was it from the great success he had at Sheffield Wednesday on trial, Auxerre, Martigues (on loan), Marseille, Bordeaux (on loan) Montpellier (on loan) or Nimes? Don’t think so. Perhaps it was when he moved to Leeds United, playing 35 times, before moving to Manchester United in 1992 for £1.2 million. He played five full seasons at Old Trafford, but just take a close look at their European successes in that time! One would expect such a star to have had an outstanding international career. No, he played just 45 times and had retired by the time France won the World Cup in 1998. Throughout his international career his faulty temperament inhibited his ability to be recognised as a player of true world class.
The main reason I consider that Cantona was lauded so much in his English career was that he was a novelty in this country at that time. At Leeds he was surrounded at home and away with British players who were fundamentally conventional, so his continental skills, arrogance and style of play shone due to their rarity. When he went to Sold Trafford and helped them to win their first title for 26 years, yes 26 years, the Man U-loving media couldn’t get enough of him and the myth was born. Yet he had so many good young players running around for him that he couldn’t fail.
Dennis came to Arsenal in 1995, his third professional club, and stayed for 11 years. He had a great start to his career at Ajax but then made the mistake of going to Inter during the early nineties when Italian football was in one of its periods of “catenaccio”. Dennis was a revelation at Arsenal and helped transform us from a good team into a great one but also added a whole aura of “big time” which enabled Arsène to build on and attract other continental stars. He truly was the start of the revolution, changing boring Arsenal to scoring Arsenal!
As for his playing career, that is something none of us who lived through it will ever forget, and to think he ended his career with us! He truly was a legend and deserves all our gratitude for coming to us, changing other fans’ attitudes to us, and staying until the end. Come back anytime Dennis.
The other example I’ll look at is Glenn Hoddle against Liam Brady. Hoddle really got on my nerves but the English press loved him. I just thought those shorts were obscene! How did he really compare to the truly great Liam Brady? If you listened to the English press, TV and radio at the time you would think Hoddle was the white Pele. He was English though and we all know what a difference that means to our media. So what did he actually achieve at Spurs? They won the FA Cup twice and the UEFA Cup during his twelve years, oh and he was in the team that was relegated in 1977! In France he won the league and cup with Monaco, having been taken there by Arsène, so I suppose he wasn’t all bad! Meanwhile, Liam won the FA Cup in 1979, plus two Serie A titles in Italy, which at the time was the strongest league in the world, while the French league Hoddle played in was not comparable. Anyone who watched Arsenal through the years Brady played for us, 1973-1980, will recall that he, along with Stapleton, O’Leary and Jennings, carried the team, but it was Brady who made everything happen; just watch the 1979 Cup Final to see his influence on the team and a match.
I was living near Leicester in 1979 and was able to see all those third round FA Cup replays with Sheffield Wednesday at Filbert Street; Brady ran all of them. I recall being sat directly behind him when he received a ball on the diagonal between the touchline and the penalty area from a throw in, let it bounce past him as he shielded it with his body and volleyed it into the top far corner. Genius! I could hear the thud as he struck it! Again, at Nottingham Forest, European Cup winners that year, I saw him put a free kick on Stapleton’s head and his countryman did the rest. But what really set Brady apart from other midfield contemporaries was that he could dribble and beat people. He had a body swerve and feint to die for and amazing balance that separated him from the rest; remember the way he rode the tackle from Macari in the ’79 FA Cup Final before the right foot cross onto Stapleton’s head. He never seemed to lose control no matter how hard he was clattered. Yes, Hoddle could pass and shoot but how many times did he go past people before doing so? As a modern comparison David Beckham would be nearer the Hoddle mark, except for the work ethic, while Brady was more of a Messi. More than any other player in my Arsenal-supporting history Brady WAS the team, which is why when he left it took ten years to recover.
He is still revered at Juventus after winning two scudettos as the playmaker and scoring the clinching penalty in the final game of the 1982 season cemented his place in their history. He was so unlucky to be replaced by Platini, but that was the type of player Juve were coveting at that time. He played in Italy for a further seven years, absorbing the culture, language and lifestyle. I admired him for that, especially when you heard how Ian Rush thought Italy was like a foreign country!
Brady of course played for Eire and never got to a major national championship; he also came up against Jack Charlton’s management style, which was more Allardyce than Wenger! So he never got the international recognition he deserved. It’s great that he’s back with us and running the youth side of things.
Hoddle’s international career saw him end up with 53 caps but he never quite found his niche as an England player and went through a series of managers who didn’t really know how to use him to their best advantage. But he was never in the Brady class!
Now, who else could we compare? How about Van Nistelrooy and Thierry?
That really used to annoy me!
