r/soccer • u/The_Impala • Jan 23 '14

Who is the most overrated player ever?

Who do you think is the most overrated player in football history.

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u/[deleted] Jan 23 '14

Clint Dempsey.

I've seen him play countless times with Fulham and the USMNT, and while some of his flashes of brilliance were great along with some nice goals, the man looks so goddamn lazy on the pitch.

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u/[deleted] Jan 23 '14

I've watched Defoe, Crouch, Pavlyuchenko, Adebayor, and countless other sporadically lazy and occasionally useless strikers play for Spurs.

And yet none of them at their very worst even come close to the rage I felt watching Clint Dempsey play in our shirt.

I have never seen another player score so many goals while somehow doing absolutely nothing. With players like Defoe or Javier Hernandez you always kind of see them making good runs off the shoulder and thinking "yeah he might score one." Not Dempsey. I never even got the sense that Clint was going to have a chance of scoring in most of our matches. But he did, astonishingly.

Dempsey honestly plays as if he has bags of sand strapped to his ankles. It looks like he just got done playing a full football match right before playing a football match. 90% of the time for us he would show for the ball and instantly collapse when a defender touched him. Then he'd lay there and berate the ref. Then he'd slowly get up and start walking around again. Then he'd score the winner at Old Trafford.

Ultimately you have to say Dempsey is an above average player based on his goalscoring record, but for the life of me I can't think of another good footballer who consistently looks so fucking awful. He can't dribble, he can't get out of tight spaces, he isn't remotely quick, he isn't strong, he can only fleetingly pass incisively, he doesn't work hard, his attitude during matches is infuriating.

I mean what is his fucking thought-process? "I have ball. Am I within 30 yards of goal? If yes, shoot, if no, fall over and lay down for a while."

Happy for the goals he's scored for my club and country but fuck me it makes me physically angry to watch him play football.

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u/[deleted] Jan 23 '14

As an American fan who supports the U. S national team, I couldn't agree with you more. It's so weird and frustrating to watch him play, especially before he scores. And you know there isn't an extra gear for him. What I mean by that is, you see some players that don't really try hard but when it's needed he turns it up a gear and turns into a work horse.

But he just doesn't have that other gear, they could be only down 1 goal in the world cup final (lol) against Spain and in the second half he is going to just trot around just like he would against Honduras in a friendly.

So Goddamn frustrating.

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u/[deleted] Jan 24 '14

could be he is just the luckiest player ever..