Messi, Ronaldo, Maradona, Pele: Football's 55 biggest legends ranked

Who is the greatest football player in history?

From the Pele to Eusebio, Diego Maradona to Zinedine Zidane, and Cristiano Ronaldo to Lionel Messi – answering that question seems a near impossible task.

Football has of course developed since the time Pele ruled the world. Tactics improve, sports science has become more advanced and training has been taken to a whole new level.

But on the flip side, it’s also probably pretty safe to say that if you’d put Pele or Maradona in the modern era, they’d have fared just as well, maybe even better with all the help footballers have in the 21st century.

Besides, they spent half their careers getting booted around muddy old fields, not wrapped in bubble wrap whilst playing on pristinely cut and watered artificial grass.

To say it’s a different world would be the understatement of the year, so we’re going to try and keep that in mind as we rank 55 of football’s biggest legends from ‘world class’ to ‘GOAT.’

Alessandro Nesta, Romario, Carles Puyol, Fabio Cannavaro, Oliver Kahn, Frank Rijkaard, Phillip Lahm, Thomas Muller, Iker Casillas, Peter Schmeichel, Didier Drogba, Roberto Carlos, Toni Kroos

Given the sheer quality of some of these footballing figures, it didn’t seem right to have a category below ‘world class’ because, after all, each and every one of them was that at the very least.

Within the category, we have plenty of goalkeeping representation in the form of Iker Casillas, Peter Schmeichel and Oliver Kahn – all of whom spent a period as arguably the best keeper on the planet.

Whilst Puyol, Cannavaro and Nesta also find themselves in this section. The three centre backs were exceptional players and, in Puyol’s case, an even better leader. However, arguably weren’t quite