Despite being the only defender to win the balon dor in recent time, I feel like he’s never mentioned among the all time great defenders. Was he truly the best player in the world in 2006? And was he one of the best cbs of his generation
He was unbelievably good at his peak
He wasn’t as good as nesta
Probably not as good as Maldini but a great in his own right.
Most of the time he’s mentioned as one of the best cbs of all time and he was definitely one the best of his generation.
He was good, but I don’t feel like he ever was really the best defender in the world. Not for the majority of people at least.
He was a great DF but people kinda overrate him because of Ballon D’or, he was excellent in that WC though.
Still one of the best DF of his generation but i would say Nesta was generally better than him.
Generally considered by italians to be just below the level of Nesta, baresi and maldini, but I’d still put him top 10 of all time.
Maldini > Cannavaro But my god what a player
I’d compare him to Thiago Silva more recently
Very good and definitely one of the best of his generation but not sure he’d make my top 10 CB’s. If he does it’d be outside the top 5 for sure. Nesta was comfortably better except for the 2006 WC. He absolutely wasn’t the best player across 2006 but he was definitely the best defender at the WC.
I feel like he’s never mentioned among the all time great defenders.
OP is getting some heat, but most people would take Maldini over him. He was much more of a household name than Cannavaro.
Put it this way… before WC2006 he was considered a solid defender, after WC2006 at the age of 33 he was propelled to superstardom.
Not at the level of Nesta and co.
He was very good. There are a few things counting against him; he had the bad luck of being from Nesta’s generation and his move to Madrid didn’t work out very well because that club was in its clownery phase. (Leave it to Real Ma-fucking-drid to still win titles during their clown periods, take notes Liverpool, Chelsea and Man Utd!)
Serie A at the time had so many great central defenders that other than Nesta they struggled to stand out individually. Maldini is an exception because he started at LB and moved in so everyone knew how great he was by then.
In 2006 WC Cannavaro really showed how great he was and that probably had to do with Nest being out injured. Not that Cannavaro was good, but he caught some many eyes compared to his previous career.
propably the only reason for not getting enough mention is that hes an italian defender, and I cant think of any other nation that gave us as many toptop world class defender as italy