Creatively/associatively Henry was clearly superior and I’m not sure Sheva was even a better goal scorer (would have to go look, and compare Italy scoring environment with England) so to begin to compensate for this.
Just don’t think there’s much of an argument. Running with the ball half the pitch and the types of goals scored has nothing to do with it.
Henry was more than just a striker who scored X amount of goals.
He would literally be in defenders nightmares the night before a game. He was a talisman that could carry us on his shoulders when the rest of the team was playing average. He could single handedly take on the Galaticos and leave them on the floor.
The only other striker that had this effect on the opposition was Ronaldo. They had the x-factor that has not been seen since.
Not downplaying all the other world class strikers since such as Aguero, Shevchenko, Drogba, Rooney etc. But none had that same effect as Henry did, don’t care what the numbers say. Any fan around the world would say Henry is one of the best strikers to ever grace the game. End of.
If you’re comparing them as pure strikers, Shevchenko was better. If you’re comparing them as players, then Henry was better because he was better at more things than Shevchenko was. But the Shevchenko of Dynamo Kyiv and Milan days (up until probaby about '04/05) was out of this world. He was every inch as good as Henry at so many things. He was an elite finisher, had world class link up play, could dribble from wide and cut inside, was powerful, had good speed and athleticism too.
Sometimes football isn’t as easy as just delving into stats and creating all of your argument from there. Shevchenko was an elite player and one of the very best European players of the 90s and 00s.
His destruction of Barcelona in 1997 has to go down as one of the great individual CL performances from a player. He tore them apart at the Camp Nou. Go back and watch Sheva for Milan and Kyiv and then you’ll see how magical and well rounded he was.
Enough time has passed since his retirement that every time some says Shevchenko all I’m seeing is @sevchenko
I watched Sheva plenty for Milan. I know what a good player he was. I agree, he’d be third after Ronaldo and Henry. But I don’t see the case for him being better, for the reasons I said.
Of course it’s not all about statistics; but they have to come into the question in these kind of arguments to have some kind of objectivity. Or else you get people making simply infactual statements like Walcott was shit or Giroud has top class link up play.
Let’s put it this way, I think more interesting arguments can be made about Del Piero, Baggio etc vs Sheva than Sheva vs Henry.
That’s exactly how I always looked on it.
Yeah, in Henry’s prime years (2002-2006) Sheva was the only striker good enough to even compare to Henry, regarding their overall quality and impact.
I always had great respect to Shevchenko… you could say he played in a harder league at that time, at least most people thought like that. He was immense. Out of all those elite goalscorers in those years, he was the only one who wasn’t dependant on what his midfield was providing… he could drop deep, exploit open space, dribble past people, combine with someone, score from distance. Obviously a much better pure no 9 than Henry, better in the box, better positioning… much more clinical.
But overall Henry had a greater impact. His creation, involvement in the build up was on another level to Shevchenko, not to mention to other strikers.
Baggio is the best number 10 of the last 30 years of football and he’s so criminally overlooked all because his career in the eyes of casual fans will always be remembered by the WC ‘94 penalty miss.
Just something I thought I’d post and not actually directly responding to your post haha.
Yeah, fantastic player. He tended to be compared to Raúl in Spain but there’s no comparison for me, Baggio was far superior. Del Piero I also think is a relatively underrated CF and is a better comparison with Shevchenko than Henry for me.
Dunno about the best 10 in the last 30 years though, that would have to go to Zidane in his prime, perhaps Özil 09-12 (he was perfection as a #10 during this period), or maybe Laudrup though I was younger and could be seeing that a bit more through rose coloured glasses.
When talking about Sheva, I’ll always remember this goal…
That’s just no position to score from. And against fucking Buffon. Absolutely insane.
I don’t think time has been as kind to Raul as it should have been though. He doesn’t get spoken about as much as he should but I think he was fantastic.
Del Piero, amazing at his peak. Totti too.
Yeah, Totti was someone I was trying to get into my team with that stupid game on Friday cause he was brilliant for so long. Italy hasn’t produced anything like him or Baggio in terms of quality since, aside from Pirlo.
I see what you mean about Raúl, fact Spain pushed on when he was dropped and the fact he’s remembered by lots as a crafty poacher rather than what he was earlier in his career/prime works against him.
Still, Baggio for me was always the superior player.
Baggio much better than Zizou. I think Zidane was such an inconsistent player who went through so many periods of his career where he contributed so little.
Baggio was just mercurial. Zidane was elegant and amazing to watch but I think Baggio impacted games more.
I don’t know, Baggio is a final third player and Zidane is someone who was always important in build up. I don’t think you can compare them as you are. I take Zidane because he’s more complete but I get the argument, from a statistical standpoint it’s easy to make an argument that Zidane is a tad overrated and not actually in the top 5 of the last few decades.
I think with Zidane a bit like with Iniesta the continued success of his teams suggests that he’s not a player that the statistics really do a great job of capturing wrt his impact.
Not the greatest video but this goes a little way to explaining why I think Zizou is overrated
I haven’t watched him in his prime… only started waching football seriously in 2002… but man, in those years I though how hugely overrated he was. For me he liked to play his own game too much, too many needless dribbles, getting nowhere with them… Insane talent and skill but often had no true impact.
Him winning fifa player of the world award in 2003 was a joke. People often claim how Henry was robbed by Nedved winning the ballond d or that year, but I never had anything against that, he was insane that year. But Zidane’s award was the robbery there.
Although, I have to say he was magical in the WC 2006. It was such a surprise he produced those performances when he was way past his peak on his way to retire.
Meant with that, that Henry had superior dribbling ability. Shevchenko however was a very complete striker himself. I just wondered if Henry would have made the same impact if not for Wenger moulding him into what he became and him taking advantage of the system. Not so much his talent.
@Midfield_Maestro Drogba might not have reached the same level but a lot for what you say goes for him too tbh. Except he went about it with power in stead of creativity.
If you’re saying that, Shearer’s better than Henry
He was 6 years old when Zidane won the world cup.
Wenger said it best when he said Drogba was “efficient” and nothing more. Doesn’t ever deserve to be in the argument for best striker, even in the PL era