Sunil Chhetri thread ...

General Discussion on Indian Football.

Moderator: Moderators

User avatar
jayakris
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 34759
Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2002 7:24 am
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Irvine, CA, USA
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by jayakris »

Ah, okay, SinHombre. I don't agree with your Ballon d'or criterion for world class. I would argue that world class extends to a much larger number of players, maybe at least 3 to 5 times the 30 who make the final of Ballon d'or every year. As for Saketh, no (not yet!). But top-100 players who make ATP events are certainly world-class. In any given year, football has many more players than ATP tour level tennis has, even in the top-20 national teams in the world, and at least 2/3rd of the players on those teams have to be considered world-class (almost all of the players in the top-10 nations need to considered world class too). I will check some numbers and get back to you later.
User avatar
arjun2761
Member
Member
Posts: 7333
Joined: Sun Apr 03, 2005 2:26 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: US
Been thanked: 7 times

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by arjun2761 »

Comparing depth of tennis to soccer is also kind of meaningless. There are probably 2000 soccer players who earn as much as a top 100 tennis player, so the depth is much more at leaSt by this metric and by many others as well...
Prashant
Member
Member
Posts: 2813
Joined: Wed Aug 18, 2004 3:48 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: Houston TX

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by Prashant »

Dempsey played on a very competent & competitive Spurs team & was a first 11 player for them. You started this discussion by placing him equivalent to Chhetri instead of CR/Messi/Rooney. I am giving you reasons why that is nonsensical. I didn't, at any point, say he was the equal of those three. Just that he is much closer in class to them than to Chhetri.

Pulisic has made starts at Dortmund, as you yourself acknowledge. So he isn't starting all the time, but as you observe, he is contention for starts. He has also been one of the best performers for the US in the last 3 games they have played. Once again - no one is hailing him as the next Messi here. Merely observing that he does not appear to be a flash in the pan.
Sin Hombre
Member
Member
Posts: 5766
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2010 6:59 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Chicago
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 5 times

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by Sin Hombre »

That's a reading comprehension fail then.

I said he was a big fish in a small pond relative to Messi/Ronaldo/Rooney which he is. Dishonest to claim that I said he was equivalent to Chettri.

Also Dempsey played one season at Spurs and they were happy to sell him at the end of it, which again says a lot. Almost all of his PL career was spent at Fulham which is a mid-to-bottom half team contrary to your claims.

As for Pulisic, he is part of the squad and everyone in the 25 man squad is literally in contention, yes. Not sure how it makes him a "starter" as you previously stated as a fact. He is yet to see a single minute of action this season for example.
Sin Hombre
Member
Member
Posts: 5766
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2010 6:59 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Chicago
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 5 times

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by Sin Hombre »

jayakris wrote: Come on. Doing that in 6 years and about 200+ games is certainly impressive. I would guess that only some 40 or 50 player have scored as many in EPL in 200 odd games, though I assume he would only fall somewhere in the top-100 goal scorers in EPL history. Now, you made the accusation that he was not a top-50 player in the world at any point in his career. None of us said he was, anyway. Dempsey is a world class player, and was among the top-50 or top-100 players in the world for a period in his career, maybe a couple of years. None of us said he was as good as Messi, Ronaldo, or Rooney.
The "EPL" is only 25 years old and English top flight professional football has existed for a lot longer. He is #599 in the all-time stakes (66 if you only restrict yourself to the limited period). Decent but not great.

57 goals in 8 league seasons is again decent.

Rooney is #32 in all time stakes for comparison. Messi and Ronaldo are #1 and #2 for La Liga (and Ronaldo is also very high up for English football).

At best, Dempsey was in the top 100 players globally for one season (not several years and if you think so, please list them). Is that world class? Not in my book and not for most people without any American bias. There would be close to a thousand active players you would have to consider world class then.
Prashant
Member
Member
Posts: 2813
Joined: Wed Aug 18, 2004 3:48 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: Houston TX

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by Prashant »

Sin Hombre wrote:I said he was a big fish in a small pond relative to Messi/Ronaldo/Rooney which he is. Dishonest to claim that I said he was equivalent to Chettri.
Please go back & read your post. I called Chhetri a big fish in a small pond. You responded "Dempsey is also a big fish in a small pond compared to the other three". Emphasis mine. Implying both an equation of Dempsey with Chhetri among those five players, and a comparison of Dempsey to Messi/CR/Rooney. The lack of clarity was in your writing, not my comprehension.

What you're doing is creating more tiers of classification than Jay or I are. We were simply pointing out that Chhetri wasn't in the class of four other players on a list. You want to subdivide those four into more layers, have at it. Point remains that Chhetri is on a much lower rung than all four of them.
Sin Hombre
Member
Member
Posts: 5766
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2010 6:59 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Chicago
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 5 times

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by Sin Hombre »

I am not sure what part of the other three is confusing, but so be it.
User avatar
jayakris
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 34759
Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2002 7:24 am
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Irvine, CA, USA
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by jayakris »

Sin Hombre wrote:
jayakris wrote: Come on. Doing that in 6 years and about 200+ games is certainly impressive. I would guess that only some 40 or 50 player have scored as many in EPL in 200 odd games, though I assume he would only fall somewhere in the top-100 goal scorers in EPL history. Now, you made the accusation that he was not a top-50 player in the world at any point in his career. None of us said he was, anyway. Dempsey is a world class player, and was among the top-50 or top-100 players in the world for a period in his career, maybe a couple of years. None of us said he was as good as Messi, Ronaldo, or Rooney.
The "EPL" is only 25 years old and English top flight professional football has existed for a lot longer. He is #599 in the all-time stakes (66 if you only restrict yourself to the limited period). Decent but not great.

57 goals in 8 league seasons is again decent.

Rooney is #32 in all time stakes for comparison. Messi and Ronaldo are #1 and #2 for La Liga (and Ronaldo is also very high up for English football).

At best, Dempsey was in the top 100 players globally for one season (not several years and if you think so, please list them). Is that world class? Not in my book and not for most people without any American bias. There would be close to a thousand active players you would have to consider world class then.
I did NOT say that he was top-100 for several years. In fact you can see right above that i said "maybe for a couple of years". One year (2012) for sure. The "several" that you quote is from the previous page, and I said "top-100 or 200 (easily) for several years". By that I mean 4 or 5 years, maybe, but I don't have stats. I generally assume that anybody who scores 57 goals in EPL over 6 years (and was top-4 in one year) is generally top-200 in the world for at least most of that period. If you want to say EPL is not that good, be my guest. I don't follow EPL closely, and I just go by everybody's reputation of the league.

And I absolutely disagree that top-100 players are the definition of "world-class". I would guess most people will disagree with you, if you say that a majority of players playing for the top-15 national teams of the world aren't world class (already about 250 players who start for that teams). I would say that almost 80% of the players in the top-5 national teams (like say ARG, BRA, GER, ITA, ENG, POR, ESP, FRA, etc), 66% of the next 5 and at least 50% of the next 10 are easily world class. That is already 60+50+75 = 185. Most of them probably play in top clubs around the world, mostly in Europe, and some in S.America and a handful in the US. Or you can count by top clubs. In fact, if you take the top 3 or 4 leagues in Europe and take the top 6 teams each, those 25 teams have about 300-350 frequent started. How can you make an argument that players who play in the top-6 teams in the top 4 leagues in Europe are not world class??? Unless I am missing something, "world class" in football needs to drop to at least around 400 or 500. If you say only top-100 is world-class, then you are also saying that only less than 20% of the players in even the top-4 teams in the top-4 leagues in Europe are world class. Then of what class are the 80% of those 250 players??

When you accuse me of an American bias, I would like to know what I am biased about. All I said is that I disagree with your assertion that the best player (other than goalies) that US had for some 8 years is not world class. It makes no logical sense to me that the top goal scorer in history for a country that has been in the world top-25 for over 25 years could NOT be world class. Instead I have to suspect that you have an anti-American bias though. More like an anti-American-football bias. Now, had you not told me that you lived in Europe earlier, I would have tried to not suspect you for it, but I have seen way too many people from Europe to know that the bias exists almost without exception. And it's indeed an annoying attitude because of the unanimity of it. I have not found a single European yet in my life who ever says that Americans can play even decent football (to a man, it is the same old "yeah right, the Yankee should give up football. They'll never make it. All their best guys go to other sports. We are the kings in this one thing in which they will never beat us, yadda yadda"). I know I am upsetting you with the accusation, but I couldn't help it, as I sensed it the moment you wrote that Demspey wasn't world class. That is pretty much serious bias, in my opinion.

But ultimately though, it's semantics. If you say "top-30 or top-100" is world class, well, that is what it is, for you. Then Dempsey was world class for one year. But I disagree, and you should also remember that you are saying that over 75% of the players even in the top 15 clubs in Europe are not world class. Hard to believe. But I am not a close observer of European leagues or anything though. As far as I can judge, I will not put the the "world-class" cut above at least top-300 in the world, more like 500 maybe.
User avatar
jayakris
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 34759
Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2002 7:24 am
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Irvine, CA, USA
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by jayakris »

Sin Hombre wrote:I said he was a big fish in a small pond relative to Messi/Ronaldo/Rooney which he is. Dishonest to claim that I said he was equivalent to Chettri.
You're right that you did not equate him to Chhetri. But I still did not understand what you meant by "big fish in a small pond". I understood in the case of Chhettri, that a lot of his goals have come against SAF opponents. How is the pond small for Demspey (as the total national goals is the discussion subject)? Are you saying that USA only plays some minnows all the time? Not arguing. Just wanted to know what you meant. I don't think USA's schedule strength is topnotch, but it is pretty decent, as they schedule a lot of friendlies against good teams. A few gimme games often come along against some CONCACAF bottom-dwellers but Mexico, Costa Rica etc are always tough opponents.
User avatar
arjun2761
Member
Member
Posts: 7333
Joined: Sun Apr 03, 2005 2:26 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: US
Been thanked: 7 times

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by arjun2761 »

Sin Hombre wrote:That's a reading comprehension fail then.

I said he was a big fish in a small pond relative to Messi/Ronaldo/Rooney which he is. Dishonest to claim that I said he was equivalent to Chettri.

Also Dempsey played one season at Spurs and they were happy to sell him at the end of it, which again says a lot. Almost all of his PL career was spent at Fulham which is a mid-to-bottom half team contrary to your claims.

As for Pulisic, he is part of the squad and everyone in the 25 man squad is literally in contention, yes. Not sure how it makes him a "starter" as you previously stated as a fact. He is yet to see a single minute of action this season for example.
Looks like Pulisic is pretty effective as a starterin the Bundesliga when he is played. He is quite likely one of the best U-18 players in the world at this point and certainly good enough already to be an effective starter at a decent top level European league team, as well as the US national team. He is on the path to becoming the greatest US player ever...
Sin Hombre
Member
Member
Posts: 5766
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2010 6:59 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Chicago
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 5 times

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by Sin Hombre »

jayakris wrote:
Sin Hombre wrote:I said he was a big fish in a small pond relative to Messi/Ronaldo/Rooney which he is. Dishonest to claim that I said he was equivalent to Chettri.
You're right that you did not equate him to Chhetri. But I still did not understand what you meant by "big fish in a small pond". I understood in the case of Chhettri, that a lot of his goals have come against SAF opponents. How is the pond small for Demspey (as the total national goals is the discussion subject)? Are you saying that USA only plays some minnows all the time? Not arguing. Just wanted to know what you meant. I don't think USA's schedule strength is topnotch, but it is pretty decent, as they schedule a lot of friendlies against good teams. A few gimme games often come along against some CONCACAF bottom-dwellers but Mexico, Costa Rica etc are always tough opponents.
CONCACAF has 41 members is for the most part, bottom-dwellers, outside Mexico and Costa Rica (only other teams in the top 40 in the elo rankings). Bit different to Europe or SA where most teams are tough. Paraguay are the 8th out of 10 teams in SA and are ranked 30th and are a very hard team to break down.

I don't rate friendlies a lot and top players who all play in Europe prioritize club football over international friendlies (as they should, they are being paid a lot to do so).
Sin Hombre
Member
Member
Posts: 5766
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2010 6:59 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Chicago
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 5 times

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by Sin Hombre »

arjun2761 wrote:
Sin Hombre wrote:That's a reading comprehension fail then.

I said he was a big fish in a small pond relative to Messi/Ronaldo/Rooney which he is. Dishonest to claim that I said he was equivalent to Chettri.

Also Dempsey played one season at Spurs and they were happy to sell him at the end of it, which again says a lot. Almost all of his PL career was spent at Fulham which is a mid-to-bottom half team contrary to your claims.

As for Pulisic, he is part of the squad and everyone in the 25 man squad is literally in contention, yes. Not sure how it makes him a "starter" as you previously stated as a fact. He is yet to see a single minute of action this season for example.
Looks like Pulisic is pretty effective as a starterin the Bundesliga when he is played. He is quite likely one of the best U-18 players in the world at this point and certainly good enough already to be an effective starter at a decent top level European league team, as well as the US national team. He is on the path to becoming the greatest US player ever...
Agree with this for the most part.

He is a top 10 u18 player in world football at the moment and as you say, well on the path to becoming the greatest US player ever.

All I am saying is that he is not an established starter (yet) and a lot of young players in similar position at the same age have failed to live up to that early potential. Let's give him time.
User avatar
jayakris
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 34759
Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2002 7:24 am
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Irvine, CA, USA
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by jayakris »

Sin Hombre wrote:CONCACAF has 41 members is for the most part, bottom-dwellers, outside Mexico and Costa Rica (only other teams in the top 40 in the elo rankings). Bit different to Europe or SA where most teams are tough. Paraguay are the 8th out of 10 teams in SA and are ranked 30th and are a very hard team to break down.

I don't rate friendlies a lot and top players who all play in Europe prioritize club football over international friendlies (as they should, they are being paid a lot to do so).
In other words, you are saying that USA plays a weak-ass group of teams and so their #22 ranking, or wins when it matters in tournaments like Copa America or world cup, are all meaningless, or something like that, right? :) .... They beat the Paraguays and Ecuadors ranked above them then, in Copa America, to reach the semi. As for friendlies, well, they matter only for 1/3rd the weight in rankings anyway. They win a truckload of them to keep their ranking actually, i would say, because they can't avoid the loss of ranking that comes from having to play the gimme teams that you mention in Concacaf. However you look at it, USA's ranking (somewhere in the 8 through 30 range consistently for 15-20 years and generally around 18-25) is legit. in fact, most of the time, except for a brief period when they were near top-10, they have been under-ranked, and it often showed at the bigger events. If my impression is correct, Dempsey has generally scored more against tougher competition, when others like Altidore failed. So again, my feeling is that your comment on "big fish in small pond" to say that Dempsey's goal records don't count much, doesn't seem right.

On Pulisic, I am with you - we will wait and see. But his skills and football acumen are unusually good, compared to what I have seen of other US-born players. His small build etc concerns me. He will hopefully remain healthy, get stronger, and will do well later. Can't say yet.
User avatar
suresh
Member
Member
Posts: 7879
Joined: Thu May 22, 2003 12:08 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: Chennai, IN

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by suresh »

This a thread for Sunil Chhetri and this (continued) discussion of Pulisic here is off-topic. ;-)
User avatar
jayakris
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 34759
Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2002 7:24 am
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Irvine, CA, USA
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Sunil Chhetri thread ...

Post by jayakris »

He is all caught and bowled (Cant't think of football puns, so I leave it to jai to find something)... Sunil Chhetri got married. A nice article with lots of great pictures - Sunil Chhetri weds long-time girlfriend Sonam Bhattacharya

She is the daughter of Subrata Bhattacharya! I hadn't heard that he was dating her for a long time. Sounds like it was a grand wedding with Chuni Goswamy (wow!) in attendance, as was Mamta Banerjee.
Post Reply