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Loyalty in Footy

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LeTallecWiz

Doos
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Keni mentioned this on the Kuyt/Reina thread ... but what players really stand out to us when discussing the word 'loyalty'?

The first player that pops to mind for me is Baresi ... Keni mentioned Exteberria (sp?).
 
I think there is a difference between say Baresi and Le Tiss. Its easy to stay loyal when you are at the European champions not so much when you win fuck all.
Totti would be the first name that springs to my mind. Madrid wanted him for years and he never wanted to leave his hometown club. He's won ONE title. For a player of his talent thats crazy.

Gerrard and Carragher too. Except for one tiny wobble.
 
Etxeberria wanted to stay at athletic but rumour is they didn't want to offer him a new contract, hence his offer to play for free.
 
Baresi stayed with Milan when they were relegated to Serie B ... that the team became phenomenal in the late 80s and 90s was his 'reward' I guess ... Le Tiss stayed with a club that never got relegated if memory serves me well.

As per Totti, Wiki states:

Winners

* Serie A (1): 2001
* Supercoppa Italiana (2): 2001, 2007
* Coppa Italia (2): 2007, 2008

Runner-up

* Serie A (6): 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2010
* Coppa Italia (4): 2003, 2005, 2006, 2010
* Supercoppa Italiana (3): 2006, 2008, 2010

Winners

* UEFA European Under-21 Championship (1): 1996
* Mediterranean Games (Under-23) (1): 1997
* FIFA World Cup (1): 2006

Runner-up

* UEFA European Under-18 Championship (1): 1995
* UEFA European Championship (1): 2000

It seems Roma were always doing well with him ... Granted he stayed despite interest from Madrid, but it's not like his team was winning 'fuck all'.
 
[quote author=LeTallecWiz link=topic=44290.msg1288191#msg1288191 date=1298200270]
Baresi stayed with Milan when they were relegated to Serie B ... that the team became phenomenal in the late 80s and 90s was his 'reward' I guess ... Le Tiss stayed with a club that never got relegated if memory serves me well.

As per Totti, Wiki states:

Winners

* Serie A (1): 2001
* Supercoppa Italiana (2): 2001, 2007
* Coppa Italia (2): 2007, 2008

Runner-up

* Serie A (6): 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2010
* Coppa Italia (4): 2003, 2005, 2006, 2010
* Supercoppa Italiana (3): 2006, 2008, 2010

Winners

* UEFA European Under-21 Championship (1): 1996
* Mediterranean Games (Under-23) (1): 1997
* FIFA World Cup (1): 2006

Runner-up

* UEFA European Under-18 Championship (1): 1995
* UEFA European Championship (1): 2000

It seems Roma were always doing well with him ... Granted he stayed despite interest from Madrid, but it's not like his team was winning 'fuck all'.
[/quote]Oh is see. You have decided so it doesnt matter what i say?

Fair enough.
 
Billy Liddell refusing an offer to increase his wage ten-fold (I think) to stay at Liverpool, including a spell in the second division 🙂
 
No, I'm giving my opinion. Baresi stayed with a club that got relegated, and that is overlooked. At the time, people thought it was career suicide. Totti never had to do that, though I would include him in the last (as I would with Le Tiss).

I would also include Shearer - staying at Newcastle when he was amongst the best in the world was a testament to his love for the club.

I'm not sure I'd include Gerrard though - maybe Carra.
 
[quote author=RolandG link=topic=44290.msg1288197#msg1288197 date=1298200451]
Paolo Maldini at AC Milan?
[/quote]

I think it's great he stayed at Milan his whole career - but he started in the mid 80s (86 I think) where Milan was well on the way to being a European power. Then again, how many teams stay at a club for 24 years?
 
[quote author=SaintGeorge67 link=topic=44290.msg1288198#msg1288198 date=1298200545]
Billy Liddell refusing an offer to increase his wage ten-fold (I think) to stay at Liverpool, including a spell in the second division 🙂
[/quote]

I was thinking about mentioning him actually
 
United fans are always having a pop at shearer, which annoys me.

He won as many league titles as their 'captain marvel' (and actually played a part in it unlike robson) and is all-time top scorer for his favourite club.

What's wrong with that?
 
I think you just need to talk about top players who were offered good chances to leave for bigger or better or for a lot more money at other clubs and chose to saty with their current clubs.
 
[quote author=LeTallecWiz link=topic=44290.msg1288199#msg1288199 date=1298200619]
No, I'm giving my opinion. Baresi stayed with a club that got relegated, and that is overlooked. At the time, people thought it was career suicide. Totti never had to do that, though I would include him in the last (as I would with Le Tiss).

I would also include Shearer - staying at Newcastle when he was amongst the best in the world was a testament to his love for the club.

I'm not sure I'd include Gerrard though - maybe Carra.
[/quote]When AC were relegated Baresi was a 19 year old who had yet to get a cap. Now i dont know if there was massive interest in him and he turned all that down OR if he was just a squad player at AC who didnt leave.
If he was in his pomp winning world cups and being the finest CB in the world and they were relegated id take that as an argument but im not sure he was 'Loyal' for staying when he was 19 years old.
And regarding Totti. Yeah like i said hes won ONE title. One of the best players in the world and he has won ONE title but never ever sought to leave.
Thats loyalty.
The names Maldini, Baresi, Costacurta, Gerrard, Adams, Giggs, Raul, Hierro etc all spring to mind but none of them in the same way as Totti and LeTiss for me. Im sure there are more who im forgetting.
 
[quote author=SaintGeorge67 link=topic=44290.msg1288205#msg1288205 date=1298200747]
United fans are always having a pop at shearer, which annoys me.

He won as many league titles as their 'captain marvel' (and actually played a part in it unlike robson) and is all-time top scorer for his favourite club.

What's wrong with that?
[/quote]I agree. Shearer is a Geordie legend and im glad he stayed there forever.
 
As I said earlier, do people think le tiss would have done the business at a top team? Bar the odd wondergoal would he have worked hard enough?

He seemed quite content to be a big fish to me, and even at southampton couldn't be arsed half the time. He wouldn't have got away with that at a bigger club methinks.

I could be wrong of course.
 
In Southampton he was more of a one headed fish in a radioactive lake. I remember at the time when he was linked to Manure some knowing older person telling me that he had that many business links on the South Coast and in Guernsey that any move away would be impractical.
 
Shearer.

He could have torn the prem up with Utd.

He didn't. Noone comes close to that for me, in my lifetime at least.
 
Haha.

Le Tissier made the right decision for him IMO. His roots on the South Coast were too deep for him to have been happy tearing them up and trying to make it somewhere else. Hunting glory isn't everybody's top priority, and thank goodness for that.
 
[quote author=Herr Onceared link=topic=44290.msg1288209#msg1288209 date=1298201070]
[quote author=LeTallecWiz link=topic=44290.msg1288199#msg1288199 date=1298200619]
No, I'm giving my opinion. Baresi stayed with a club that got relegated, and that is overlooked. At the time, people thought it was career suicide. Totti never had to do that, though I would include him in the last (as I would with Le Tiss).

I would also include Shearer - staying at Newcastle when he was amongst the best in the world was a testament to his love for the club.

I'm not sure I'd include Gerrard though - maybe Carra.
[/quote]When AC were relegated Baresi was a 19 year old who had yet to get a cap. Now i dont know if there was massive interest in him and he turned all that down OR if he was just a squad player at AC who didnt leave.
[/quote]

He was 20 when they got relegated the firs time (80/81) and 22 the second time (82/83). He was a member of Italy's winning team in '82, and was warned that staying with AC Milan could cost him his spot. How many players do you think would stay with their home town team if they got relegated twice in a period of 3 years?

Totti is class, and I won't argue that.

Del Piero is another good shout ...
 
This is an article featured on RAWK front page about Baresi and loyalty by a AC fan. Good article. This pre-dates Istanbul.

As a lifetime AC Milan fan, with a Liverpool supporting girlfriend, I would like to give you my view on Steven Gerrard and his future at Liverpool.

Steven Gerrard: 24 years old, Liverpool captain, from Merseyside, a homegrown talent. Now, I believe most of you reading have played football when kids (some of you are probably still playing now, like me, in those cold Sunday mornings, in some local amateur league, sorting out the nets, the money for the ref, bringing home muddy boots for the missus' delight...).

We all started in the same fashion and so did Mr Gerrard: in the streets and in the school playgrounds, with jumpers for goalposts, spending hours arguing wether the ball was or wasn't gone over a bar that wasn't there to begin with. Preferring a game of football with your mates to anything else that there was in life. And if we weren't playing football... we would be watching it.

Whether you were a striker or a defender, whether you were good or bad, whether you were you or you were Steven Gerrard the dream was one for all of us:

TO WEAR THE LIVERPOOL SHIRT AND THE CAPTAIN'S ARMBAND AT ANFIELD IN FRONT OF THE KOP

You can change that to AC Milan and the San Siro if for me. I am sure every single one of you had that dream of putting on the Red shirt and the armband. Some of you probably still do! Well, so did Steven Gerrard.

This is why as a neutral I can not understand nor tolerate the fact that the guy is even thinking of a career outside Liverpool! Can you?

Being captain of your own team at the age of 24, playing Champions League football ... is that not enough?

If Gerrard was to stay he almost certainly will be Liverpool captain for another 10 years. He will almost certainly win trophies in the next 10 years. He will be Liverpool greatest player during his nearly 20 years with the club's first team. He will be a legend. He will probably be remembered as the best Liverpool player ever. He will be what Franco Baresi has been to Milan.

Does anyone know what Baresi did in the early eighties? Here's what has happened: At 14 Baresi joins Milan after Inter (where is older brother was playing) rejected him, how foolish of them! He makes his debut very young and in 1979 wins the title with Milan. A couple of years later Milan gets relegated from Serie A to Serie B. The club is in a mess having being involved in match fixing and the club's owner ran away. The club was in total crisis, seeing the light at the end of the tunnel was impossible.

A few weeks later city's rival Inter make an offer for Baresi and Baresi's partner in the middle of the defence Collovati. Straight away Collovati joins Inter. A then very young Baresi (21-22) is made captain of a falling giant. He's regarded by most as the best young talent of his generation and the 1982 World Cup is around the corner. Staying with Milan playing in Serie B would probably jeopardise his chances of going to the World Cup. Joining Inter would mean playing alongside his brother and enjoying the race for title every season at a club flushed with money. Collovati had no doubt in his mind that the right choice was to join Inter. But what did Baresi do? The similarity with the Steven Gerrard's situation was so big I had to write this article.

Liverpool are nowhere near as bad as AC Milan was in the early eighties.

What should Steven Gerrard do? What did Franco Baresi do?

I am sure most of you know what Baresi did but I'll tell you anyway: HE STAYED AT MILAN! He played for them in Serie B. He was so good he was picked for the World Cup squad anyway. Milan won the Serie B league and came straight up only to go down again one season later. More offers came in for Baresi. Did he regret his original choice? Did he join Inter, Juve? Did he? Of course he didn't. He played for Milan in Serie B again. That's what I call a man!

In the following years with Milan he won promotion and then went on to win the European Cup three times (now better known as Champions League), he won the Intercontinental Cup twice, the European Super Cup 3 times, the Italian League 5 times (to add to the win in 1979), and played a total of 5 European Cup Finals. He became for every Milan fan 'Il Capitano' (The Captain, capital T and capital C).

When he retired from football in 1997 the club not only organised a match for him in the San Siro where 85,000 paying supporters saw him and the Milan players play the likes of Maradona, Romario, Careca, Koeman, Mattheus but also the jersey with the number 6, the number he worn for so many years, was retired as well. No more Milan players will ever wear the number 6 (this week has been announced that the same will happen with Paolo Maldini's number 3 when he retires).

Thinking forward should Gerrard commit himself to Liverpool for life? I can not see why he shouldn't be able to experience the same glory and all time legendary status. It all goes back to that one dream we had when we were playing in the streets. The day that dream ends football will end with it. I wish Steven Gerrard will realize this.

By the way: how many of you knew who Collovati was? To Milan fans he's a traitor, that's all, who left the club in their hour of need. I have to wash my mouth every time I say his name. Baresi in contrast is an immortal.

http://www.redandwhitekop.com/article.php?id=805313
 
Good golly Miss Molly. The fact that they have members capable of writing like that makes it all the more amazing that they can go off at a tangent about Lucas or Rafa the way they do.
 
It cuts both ways. Clubs now treat players as assets that help increase the value of their club. There is always a way for the owners to improve on these assets and they are quite ruthless about it.

If Lucas wanted to be loyal, does he have a chance? In the good old days, hard-work, loyalty and dedication accounted for something, but these days it's all about results....why should the players care?

The attitude filters from the club down to the players, it's not the other way round...especially when it comes to homegrown players like Gerrard and Carra.

I think if Fowler was not sold, he would have retired a Liverpool player....but we preferred to cash in.
 
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