usually i don't post in theese threads as i find quite boring to establish theese kind of rankings. we could name hundreds of players for weeks who were great in free kicks.
it's already hard to compare "still playing players" (actually i'd say it isn't just hard, it's also useless and silly).... how can we expect to establish a plausible "all time ranking"???.
we're young. there are hundreds of players, of great players we never saw playing, hundreds of players we don't even know.
just to make an example, just 2 guys named mihajlovic, who used to score on free kicks like they were penalties.... just one of u named le roi platini and Hagi. Nobody mentioned ronaldinho, zidane, del piero, guardiola, pirlo, recoba, totti, valeron, okocha, baggio, mancini , almeyda, Djorkaeff.........:roll:
and i guess many of u don't even remember
rivelino, eder,
zico, falcao, giannini, sivori,
corso....
that's why i think it's impossible to establish a faithful individual ranking in football (best free kicker, best playmaker, best cb, best scorer....)
nontheless this thread makes me remind of a nice anecdote (and that's the reason why i'm writing this post).
1985, napoli - juventus. the ref establishes an indirect free kick inside the box, juventus players placed their "wall" too close to maradona (there should be 9 meters between the ball and the wall, juventus players were probably 3 meters far from the ball). Giordano get mad with the ref, asking him to presuade juventus players to respect the regular distance.... but Diego said "shut up Bruno, i'll score anyway"... then bruno giordano calmed down and witnessed (as all of us) one of the greatest moments in football history. A sweet caress to the ball, the sphere flies over juventus wall and then fantastically get down, as it was remote controlled.
in less than 11 meters that ball followed an impossible trajectory.
that was my first time at San Paolo stadium
here it is... unfortunately this replay is awful and u can't really appreciate this free kick from this point of view, but it's still better than nothing. nontheless it's quite weird you tube hasn't a decent replay of one of the most famous free kicks in history :roll:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zIJKhxM9LA