Originally posted by koorosh
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For me when I say greatest player, I speak solely for the product on the field, consistency, and level of opposition.
I think Nekounam is a great player and his longevity and consistency for his club and TM (especially when we were pretty miserable in every position except for him, Ando, and Seyed Jalal...), but he never had the high level play in the Champions League. He had one excellent UEFA Cup (now Europa League) run.
I won't compare Nekounam and Taremi any further as they are in different positions on teh field, so I will compare to Daei.
So in terms of continental club football
Taremi - 3 Champions League tournaments - 9 goals, went as far as
1 Europa League tournament - no goals
Daei - 2 Champions League tournaments (one for Bayern, one for Hertha) - 4 goals
1 UEFA league tournament - 2 goals (I think one was in the qualifiers)
In terms of European domestic football
Taremi - 60+ goals at club level in Portuguese league
Daei - 19 goals at club level in Bundesliga.
International football
Daei obviously has more goals, but without Taremi's goals (game winners versus Uzbekistan, China, Qatar in 2018, and versus Iraq, UAE x2) we would have missed out on World Cup 2022 and World Cup 2026.
Daei was vital in only one qualification campaign - WC 1998.
World Cup
Daei has one super assist (Mahdavikia goal versus US), and 5 games.
Taremi has one assist and 2 goals.
Asian Cup
This is where Daei is better.
He was top scorer in 1996. Has 2 x 3rd place finishes.
Taremi was excellent in Asia Cup 2019 but we missed him in the semis due to yellow card accumulation.
I would say Taremi has surpassed Daei simply because he has been better as an individual in Europe.
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