The quality of strikers today vs late 90s / early 2000s

VorZakone

What would Kenny G do?
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These are the main relevant strikers in football today in no particular order:

Suarez, Lewandowski, Aguero, Morata, Benzema, Higuain, Lukaku, Cavani, Lacazette, Kane, Diego Costa, Belotti, Chicharito, Aubameyang, Bakambu, Batshuayi, Dzeko, Ben Yedder, Vietto, Welbeck, G. Jesus, Werner, Iheanacho, Vardy, Icardi, Alcacer, Mandzukic, Jovetic, Milik, Falcao, Dybala, Griezmann, Mbappe


Compare it to the late 90s and early 2000s where you had (feel free to mention the ones I missed):

Henry, Van Nistelrooy, Shearer, Yorke, Cole, Del Piero, Ronaldo, Batistuta, Raul, Shevchenko, Trezeguet, H. Larsson, Solskjear, Owen, Crespo, Kluivert, Vieri, Morientes, Pauleta, Makaay, Inzaghi, Tristan, Hasselbaink, Viduka, Elber, Rivaldo

To be honest, for a while I felt that we had a real lack of quality strikers today but when you look at the lists, it's actually not bad at all IMO.
 
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you forgot Zlatan and Dybala in the first list. Griezmann maybe too if you see him as a striker. There are some strikers not belonging in the same group and miles apart, but i do think objectively looking that there are some very good strikers around nowadays. Subjectively, if i look at the names from the second list, they seem like better quality and world class, but i guess thats the romantic child in me that saw football with different eyes back then.

On the second list i would add Claudio Lopez and maybe Zamorano and Salas? Enrico Chiesa too
 
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90s/2000s group looks much more talented - out of the current bunch I'd say only a handful, maybe four or five, are truly world class, while Henry, RvN, Shearer, Del Piero, Batistuta, Raul, Sheva, Ronaldo, Rivaldo, Vieri, Kluivert and so on were the top of the top, arguably all of them at some point would make it to top3, maybe top5 players in the world.

Then again, football has changed and spotlight is stolen by inside forwards and players that can't be defined with a one-word role. Last few years none of top3 players in the world - as I'd put Neymar ahead of Suarez and Lewy - was a proper striker.
 
Red Star One said:
90s/2000s group looks much more talented - out of the current bunch I'd say only a handful, maybe four or five, are truly world class, while Henry, RvN, Shearer, Del Piero, Batistuta, Raul, Sheva, Ronaldo, Rivaldo, Vieri, Kluivert and so on were the top of the top, arguably all of them at some point would make it to top3, maybe top5 players in the world.

Then again, football has changed and spotlight is stolen by inside forwards and players that can't be defined with a one-word role. Last few years none of top3 players in the world - as I'd put Neymar ahead of Suarez and Lewy - was a proper striker.
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Yeah peak-wise the late 90s/2000s had better strikers I agree.
 
I would also add rooney, considering the amount of goals he has scored. As for your question I prefer the striker that were playing in the 90s and early 2000s ,just because that has my two favourite strikers ronaldo and Van nistelrooy. I have not seen anything like the former and the latter was one of the reason I am a manchester united fan so for 90s group wins it.
 
VorZakone said:
These are the main relevant strikers in football today in no particular order:

Suarez, Lewandowski, Aguero, Morata, Benzema, Higuain, Lukaku, Cavani, Lacazette, Kane, Diego Costa, Belotti, Chicharito, Aubameyang, Bakambu, Batshuayi, Dzeko, Ben Yedder, Vietto, Welbeck, G. Jesus, Werner, Iheanacho, Vardy, Icardi, Alcacer, Mandzukic, Jovetic, Milik, Falcao, Dybala, Griezmann, Mbappe


Compare it to the late 90s and early 2000s where you had (feel free to mention the ones I missed):

Henry, Van Nistelrooy, Shearer, Yorke, Cole, Del Piero, Ronaldo, Batistuta, Raul, Shevchenko, Trezeguet, H. Larsson, Solskjear, Owen, Crespo, Kluivert, Vieri, Morientes, Pauleta, Makaay, Inzaghi, Tristan, Hasselbaink, Viduka, Elber, Rivaldo

To be honest, for a while I felt that we had a real lack of quality strikers today but when you look at the lists, it's actually not bad at all IMO.
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Honestly I feel its not just striker. Its all over the pitch and certain nations have went to complete junk. Fair enough we've seen the rise of Spain but the declines of Italy and Holland, the falling away of countries like Croatia, Czech Republic, Nigeria etc...

Take Euro 2000 as an example.
England sent a squad with Scholes, Beckham, Gerrard, Owen, Shearer, Adams and Sol Campbell
Italy sent a squad with Maldini, Nesta, Cannavaro, Totti, Del Piero, Inzaghi, Conte etc...
What was seen as a fairly weak Germany had Matthaus, Ballack, Bierhoff and Oliver Kahn.
What is now also a weak enough Spanish squad had Raul, Casillas, Guardiola, Hierro, Mendieta
France had an immense squad with: Henry, Zidane, Desailly, Viera, Blanc, Pires, Trezeguet, Djorkaeff, Deschamps etc...
Holland were incredible compared to the joke they are now: VDS, Stam, De Boer, Seedorf, Davids, Kluivert, Bergkamp...

The other squads in the tournies had players like:
Nedved, Rosicky, Solskjaer, Riise, Mijatovic, Stankovic, Mihajlovic, Rustu, Hakan Sukur, Ljunberg, Larsson, Hagi, Chivu, Mutu, Rui Costa, Luis Figo, Paulo Sousa,

Football has certainly declinded. I blame the rise of video games and kids not playing sports.
 
Was thinking about this very topic the other day. Those 90s strikers were just something else.

Salas, Ronaldo, Vieri, Crespo, Batistuta, etc - just wow :drool:
 
You guys are doing that thing where you act like all the players were at their peak at the same time. There is a lot of quality strikers right now. We are not lacking in that department at all in the current Football landscape.
 
Crashoutcassius said:
I think we had better number 10s back then... but strikers yeah seems like a wash to me
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That's what I was thinking. Nowadays there's better wingers, 10s and, maybe, certain types of midfielders. But there's less brilliant strikers and defenders.
 
Welbeck, Michy, Icardi, Ihaenacho, Alcacer and a few others probably don't deserve to be in that list
 
I remember England had Shearer, Sheringham, Fowler, Ferdinand, Wright, Cole, Collymore, Dublin and Scholes to choose from for Euro 96. And players like Chris Sutton and Chris Armstrong who were useful but rarely got a look in due to the level of English centre forwards. Unreal period.
 
As for the thread, that's because you're comparing the strikers in the present with strikers in a period of 8 to 10 years from the past and you're thinking of those players at their peak while thinking of the players from the present in their current form.

From 2009 to 2017 there's Tevez, Rooney, Forlan, Suarez, Van Persie, Ibra, Lewandowski, Higuain, Benzema, Falcao, Aguero, Diego Costa, Harry Kane, Villa, Torres, Milito, Icardi, Belotti, Chicharito, Morata, Cavani, Lacazette, Aubameyang, Dzeko, Griezmann, Berbatov, Mandzukic, Mario Gomez, Di Natale, Lukaku and probably many others I'm forgetting
 
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Tyrion said:
That's what I was thinking. Nowadays there's better wingers, 10s and, maybe, certain types of midfielders. But there's less brilliant strikers and defenders.
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Disagree, hardly any top quality wingers around, they are more wide forwards like Ronaldo, Bale, Robben, Messi, Neymar.
I reckon if we had a young Giggs and Kanchelskis now Giggs would be RW and Kanchelskis would be LW
 
How the feck do Welbeck and Vietto get on the list? Alcacer too is a stretch seen as he barely plays for Barça. Iheanacho? Batshuayi? The feck?

90's strikers shit all over current ones IMO but then 90's big stars shit all over current ones anyway overall.
 
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There is some serious overrating of past strikers here. The lack of TV coverage added mystique to some of those players as we only got to see them on the big memorable occasions. Comparing from different eras is simply impossible, there are just way too many variables that produce the final product. The only one from that time that I can think of without any peer today is Ronaldo.
 
Theonas said:
There is some serious overrating of past strikers here. The lack of TV coverage added mystique to some of those players as we only got to see them on the big memorable occasions. Comparing from different eras is simply impossible, there are just way too many variables that produce the final product. The only one from that time that I can think of without any peer today is Ronaldo.
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Oh, come on! Try making a top ten from both lists and see how many from the first make it!
 
Problems when doing stuff like this is that people often lump a larger timeframe together for past athletes just assuming the best form for each one even and look back at the quality of players in hindsight. Favors the past heavily.
 
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paulscholes18 said:
Disagree, hardly any top quality wingers around, they are more wide forwards like Ronaldo, Bale, Robben, Messi, Neymar.
I reckon if we had a young Giggs and Kanchelskis now Giggs would be RW and Kanchelskis would be LW
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The players you mention are played as wide forwards because that's how teams set up.

All could/would have been played as orthodox wingers in the 90's and all would have been world class there.
 
padr81 said:
Take Euro 2000 as an example.
England sent a squad with Scholes, Beckham, Gerrard, Owen, Shearer, Adams and Sol Campbell
Italy sent a squad with Maldini, Nesta, Cannavaro, Totti, Del Piero, Inzaghi, Conte etc...
What was seen as a fairly weak Germany had Matthaus, Ballack, Bierhoff and Oliver Kahn.
What is now also a weak enough Spanish squad had Raul, Casillas, Guardiola, Hierro, Mendieta
France had an immense squad with: Henry, Zidane, Desailly, Viera, Blanc, Pires, Trezeguet, Djorkaeff, Deschamps etc...
Holland were incredible compared to the joke they are now: VDS, Stam, De Boer, Seedorf, Davids, Kluivert, Bergkamp...

The other squads in the tournies had players like:
Nedved, Rosicky, Solskjaer, Riise, Mijatovic, Stankovic, Mihajlovic, Rustu, Hakan Sukur, Ljunberg, Larsson, Hagi, Chivu, Mutu, Rui Costa, Luis Figo, Paulo Sousa,

Football has certainly declinded. I blame the rise of video games and kids not playing sports.
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Great example for the phenomenon I described.

Ballack was a complete nobody in 2000, Matthäus was 40 years old. Someone like Henry and Trezeguet were not seen like the player you have in mind back in 2000.

I'm not saying today's players have more quality, just think the method is flawed.
 
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Theonas said:
The only one from that time that I can think of without any peer today is Ronaldo.
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If we just take the 1998 World Cup vs 2014 to have two single-year time stamps it's a tough read.

1998
Ronaldo
Rivaldo
Bebeto
Eto'o (17 at time)
Zamorano
Salas
Del Piero
Roberto Baggio
Inzaghi
Chiesa
Vieri
B. Laudrup
Djorkaeff
Henry
Trezeguet
McCarthy
Stoichkov
Morientes
Raul
Kiko
Bergkamp
Kluivert
Hooijdonk
Hasselbaink
Klinsmann
Bierhoff
Mijatovic
Shearer
Sheringham
Ferdinand
Owen
Lopez
Batistuta
Balbo
Crespo
Suker

2014
Hulk
Fred
Neymar
Eto'o (Now 33)
Sanchez
van Persie
Robben
Villa
Costa
Drogba (36)
Rooney
Ballotelli
Suarez
Cavani
Benzema
Giroud
Higuain
Messi
Aguero
Dzeko
Podolski
Klose
Muller
Ronaldo
Lukaku

Those two lists are incomparable. The worst of the top list is better than half the bottom list.
 
A lot of Nostalgia at play here. I'd say the strikers of today are on par with the strikers of the late 90's. Had we not seen the complete dominance of Messi and Ronaldo, we'd have appreciated the talents of today much more.
 
Mr.Ridiculous__ said:
A lot of Nostalgia at play here. I'd say the strikers of today are on par with the strikers of the late 90's. Had we not seen the complete dominance of Messi and Ronaldo, we'd have appreciated the talents of today much more.
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Messi and Cristiano are players we are going to struggle to describe to people in 20 years who never got to see them in their primes. But, we sort of shrug our shoulders at them at this point because they have been so insanely good for so long.
 
Another point, I'd like to raise is that this forum often talks about how there were better defenders in the 90's. That might well be true, but looking at games from that period, I noticed that teams these days are much better set up than they used to. The entire defensive setup starts from the strikers to the midfielders and finally to the centre backs. In the 90's, atleast the games I have watched, the games were a lot more open and teams did not defend as well as a unit. It was left to a few stellar names to actually defend against these strikers. I'd love to see a Henry or a RVN , against a packed Atletico defence with Saul and Koke trailing their every move. I'm not underrating Henry, but there is a distinct lack of credit given to the modern striker.

PS: With Inzaghi's all round game, he wouldn't make it at any top club now.
 
UnrelatedPsuedo said:
Those two lists are incomparable. The worst of the top list is better than half the bottom list.
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Absolutely not. Take a closer look how each player performed that year and not what you associate with the name.

Guivarc'h started over Henry and Trezeguet to give you a hint.

Some notable player who missed the '14 WC are Zlatan, Lewa, Bale, Tevez and Falcao. Romario in '98 from what I recall.
 
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Mr.Ridiculous__ said:
Another point, I'd like to raise is that this forum often talks about how there were better defenders in the 90's. That might well be true, but looking at games from that period, I noticed that teams these days are much better set up than they used to. The entire defensive setup starts from the strikers to the midfielders and finally to the centre backs. In the 90's, atleast the games I have watched, the games were a lot more open and teams did not defend as well as a unit. It was left to a few stellar names to actually defend against these strikers. I'd love to see a Henry or a RVN , against a packed Atletico defence with Saul and Koke trailing their every move. I'm not underrating Henry, but there is a distinct lack of credit given to the modern striker.

PS: With Inzaghi's all round game, he wouldn't make it at any top club now.
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Well Atletico are basically the Valencia of the late 90s/early 00s and we only beat them once and drew 3 times. As for Inzaghi you have to be joking :wenger:
 
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Mr.Ridiculous__ said:
Another point, I'd like to raise is that this forum often talks about how there were better defenders in the 90's. That might well be true, but looking at games from that period, I noticed that teams these days are much better set up than they used to. The entire defensive setup starts from the strikers to the midfielders and finally to the centre backs. In the 90's, atleast the games I have watched, the games were a lot more open and teams did not defend as well as a unit. It was left to a few stellar names to actually defend against these strikers. I'd love to see a Henry or a RVN , against a packed Atletico defence with Saul and Koke trailing their every move. I'm not underrating Henry, but there is a distinct lack of credit given to the modern striker.

PS: With Inzaghi's all round game, he wouldn't make it at any top club now.
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Agree with what you're saying except the part about Inzaghi. If Icardi and Lukaku with limited all roind play are doing very well at top clubs, Inzaghi would be able do it too.
 
Schneckerl said:
Absolutely not. Take a closer look how each player performed that year and not what you associate with the name.

Guivarc'h started over Henry and Trezeguet to give you a hint.

Some notable player who missed the '14 WC are Zlatan, Lewa, Bale, Tevez and Falcao. Romario in '98 from what I recall.
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You're trying to make the opposite point of mine.

The single year world cup time stamp takes career peaks into account to have a single point of comparison and discussion. I'm not saying that for that single year all players were at their peak. For that year, they all appeared in World Cup squads.

Other posts here are throwing decades of players against 2017's players. That makes far less sense.

What I will say is that if you take a top 10 from each, there's comparable quality. Or at least a discussion. A top 20 or 25 there's no contest.
 
Mr.Ridiculous__ said:
Another point, I'd like to raise is that this forum often talks about how there were better defenders in the 90's. That might well be true, but looking at games from that period, I noticed that teams these days are much better set up than they used to. The entire defensive setup starts from the strikers to the midfielders and finally to the centre backs. In the 90's, atleast the games I have watched, the games were a lot more open and teams did not defend as well as a unit. It was left to a few stellar names to actually defend against these strikers. I'd love to see a Henry or a RVN , against a packed Atletico defence with Saul and Koke trailing their every move. I'm not underrating Henry, but there is a distinct lack of credit given to the modern striker.

PS: With Inzaghi's all round game, he wouldn't make it at any top club now.
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What are you talking about? He'd walk in the door pretty much everywhere. There is a weird myth that Inzaghi just stood there and waited for the ball.
 
Let the players from the first list play out their entire careers and see if they compare to those who've already played out theirs. Impossible to compare the likes of Batistuta and G.Jesus like for like when you already know how the career of the former played out, while the other is just beginning his.
 
Burrow said:
Let the players from the first list play out their entire careers and see if they compare to those who've already played out theirs. Impossible to compare the likes of Batistuta and G.Jesus like for like when you already know how the career of the former played out, while the other is just beginning his.
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This is why I picked two freeze frames in time in the lists above. 1998 vs 2014 seemed fair. Anyone that hasn't kicked on in the last 3 years probably isn't going to.

From the 98 list, Henry, Trezeguet, Eto'o, Kluivert, Owen, Ronaldo all kicked on, all being under 21 at the time.
From the 2014 list only Neymar and Lukaku were young. There aren't really any other young standouts there.
 
padr81 said:
Honestly I feel its not just striker. Its all over the pitch and certain nations have went to complete junk. Fair enough we've seen the rise of Spain but the declines of Italy and Holland, the falling away of countries like Croatia, Czech Republic, Nigeria etc...

Take Euro 2000 as an example.
England sent a squad with Scholes, Beckham, Gerrard, Owen, Shearer, Adams and Sol Campbell
Italy sent a squad with Maldini, Nesta, Cannavaro, Totti, Del Piero, Inzaghi, Conte etc...
What was seen as a fairly weak Germany had Matthaus, Ballack, Bierhoff and Oliver Kahn.
What is now also a weak enough Spanish squad had Raul, Casillas, Guardiola, Hierro, Mendieta
France had an immense squad with: Henry, Zidane, Desailly, Viera, Blanc, Pires, Trezeguet, Djorkaeff, Deschamps etc...
Holland were incredible compared to the joke they are now: VDS, Stam, De Boer, Seedorf, Davids, Kluivert, Bergkamp...

The other squads in the tournies had players like:
Nedved, Rosicky, Solskjaer, Riise, Mijatovic, Stankovic, Mihajlovic, Rustu, Hakan Sukur, Ljunberg, Larsson, Hagi, Chivu, Mutu, Rui Costa, Luis Figo, Paulo Sousa,

Football has certainly declinded. I blame the rise of video games and kids not playing sports.
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Are you sure about that ?
 
The players and teams of this era are second to none. You only have to watch premier league years on Sky to have that made apparent.
 
Young players coming up today have probably played more organized Football than any other past generation.
 
Don't know if it's nostalgia clouding my judgement but I think the strikers from a couple decades ago were better overall than the strikers of today, with the exception of Messi and Ronaldo of course.
 
I think attacking wise we're doing better than back then

Someone like salas for example was never as good as costa
 
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