Has football ever been better?

[thehumblegringo]

I see that, apparently, it's only us old gits who don't think football is better than its ever been - speaking as someone who always tries to avoid the trap of saying everything was better in my day, I must point out the obvious fact that you would expect older people to give a more reliable answer to the question asked in the thread title because they have seen more football than those who appear to be eager to write their views off.

Anyway, that's by the by. Although I thought that, given the prize that was at stake, Ajax were very naive in not trying to run the clock down in those closing minutes when they had plenty of opportunities to do so, I accept that their match with Spurs was a very good game of football, but Liverpool v Barcelona? I'm not so sure about that one.

I can only think of the Brazil side from the 1970 World Cup as a team I have seen that might have been able to beat the Barcelona side of around 2010/11. That Barcelona side were fantastic, but in recent years they have been a long way short of that standard as evidenced by the number of very heavy defeats (one or two of which they have been able to overturn) in away ties in the latter stages of the Champions League. I didn't watch the First Leg, but everything I have seen or read about it said that Barca were flattered by their margin of victory, so was what happened on Tuesday really the miracle it is portrayed as being?

For me, Liverpool's first goal was down to a dreadful individual error by Barcelona's left back, there will be those who say their keeper should have saved the second one (I wouldn't be one of them mind), the third was a free header in the six yard box and while the fourth was brilliantly conceived and executed, it owed a lot, as did their first goal down here, to a defence that fell asleep at a corner.

Fantastic drama? Absolutely, but proof for a theory that football has never been better? I don't think so.

In terms of pure quality the Man City vs Spurs 2nd leg was one of the best games of football I have ever seen.

The quality of the attacking play by Man City and the speed and cleverness of Tottenham in transition was off the scale.

I have watched football since the mid 80s and the speed and quality of the game now is on another level.

How people can make the accusation that people like De Bruyne, Hazard, Sterling, Mane, Silva, Eriksen etc are robots is beyond me.

As I get older and the mob mentality at football has ebbed out I find myself going to football to enjoy watching players do things I could only dream of doing rather than my sole purpose of going to football being to watch my team win and I can honestly say I am far more likely to see exceptional footballers at our stadium now than I was 20 years ago.

[the other bob wilson]

In terms of pure quality the Man City vs Spurs 2nd leg was one of the best games of football I have ever seen.

The quality of the attacking play by Man City and the speed and cleverness of Tottenham in transition was off the scale.

I have watched football since the mid 80s and the speed and quality of the game now is on another level.

How people can make the accusation that people like De Bruyne, Hazard, Sterling, Mane, Silva, Eriksen etc are robots is beyond me.

As I get older and the mob mentality at football has ebbed out I find myself going to football to enjoy watching players do things I could only dream of doing rather than my sole purpose of going to football being to watch my team win and I can honestly say I am far more likely to see exceptional footballers at our stadium now than I was 20 years ago.

The contrast between the Spurs team in their recent away games in the Premier League and what they did away from home in their last two Champions League matches is startling and, daft as it may sound, I think there is a case for leaving Kane out of the Final even if he is fit.

Regarding robotic players, I believe they are more "programmed" than they used to be in that the overall plan is now all encompassing, but I'd agree with your point about the individuals you mention - the best managers and coaches are still prepared to allow individual expression to flourish within their "system".

Nevertheless, I stick to my point about the standard of defending not being as good as it once was. In many ways of course that's a good thing, but it would be interesting to see how players such as Baresi, Maldini, Scirea, Cannavaro, Blanc, Thuram and Passarella (with the exception of the last named, they were all footballers as well as defenders and would not have suffered much because of the lessening of the amount of "physical" defending allowed these days) would have coped today.