Suarez vs Eto'o

2 #9s involved in 2 trebles. Who has the better 'ability', who is the better footballer? In terms of career Suarez is nowhere near so let's get that out of the way. Who would you want to lead your line? Prime Eto'o or Superboy Prime Suarez? Both worked their asses off and pressed the referees...I mean defenders.

I'm happy these  legends play(ed) for us (:

Despite his antics I've always loved Eto'o. He's a bit better imo .

In Eto’o’s years Messi wasn’t what he is today.
On the other hand the mids were superhuman compare to today’s.
I will say Eto’o for now but I’d like t see Suarez in another year to judge properly

It's a tough one, I cant choose one with any certainty. I think I prefer Etoo, but I mean Suarez has a long time (probably) still to change my mind and the length of Etoo's stint at Barca surely plays a part in my thoughts.

Suarez can create something out of nothing, Etoo could to a degree too but Suarez is more likely to.

Etoo in his best days has searing speed. Suarez isnt slow but he can be caught by the quickest defenders, whereas if Etoo gets in front of you its truly over.

Both are defensively responsible, put intense pressure on the backline. I would say Etoo might slightly edge it though, he played second left back for Inter, not even in his physical prime.

Both can play with their back to goal, neither are Jan Koller in that regard but have the ability to make 50-50 balls their own a little more often.

Neither particular strong in the air, but capable.

Im willing to be convinced one way or another though.

suarez imo (not basing this on barcelona, but their overall game). as good as eto'o was, he used to miss a lot of chances. the two seasons forlan picked the pichichi title for instance, the last couple of days into the campaign teammates were feeding eto'o and ronaldo (in the 05 season), and eto'o would just mess up the chance, same happened in the 09 season...he would score when it mattered but he used to miss a lot. technically too suarez is probably better, his passing, set piece taking, dribbling trumps eto'o's...both can succeed in almost any scenario, suarez carried liverpool, though a big club by name, they're shit without him. eto'o did very well at mallorca, i remember he was tormenting us at madrid even in those mallorca days, they were one of our bogey teams away from home, and he was instrumental in their spanish cup win...between the two temperamental geniuses, if i had a choice for i want on my team, i'd take suarez.....but that eto'o champions league goal, i can't remember against who, where he curved the ball, that goal was super

Suarez imo. Eto'o is love & life but Luisito is just the more complete player.

hopefully, by the time suarez' career is ending at barcelona, eto'o becomes rated the better player for the club (not overall), i'm not into the business of wishing rivals well

Suarez, for me, is the more talented and versatile player.

What edges it in favour of Suarez is that Suarez is the total team player. He's passing A LOT and celebrating his teammates' goals as if he scored the World Cup final winning goal himself. Eto'o didn't. He would always pull the trigger if he could. Most strikers do yet Suarez has the eye for his teammates even when he has no business passing in the position he's in.

Eto'o assist* in his Barca treble season: 7
Suarez assist in his Barca treble season: 24

*Transfermarkt (wide assist) criteria. Eto'o also played considerably more without a ban and with Barca going through CL qualifiers.

Actually, when I think about it, it's quite the big advantage for Suarez.

As strikers they might be equal. As footballers Suarez wins.

I am not interested personally in who assists more. They have really different roles in the team and that will always skew everything.

Ronaldinho was a provider more than anything, he created for everyone. Messi obviously is a creator aswell as scorer, Guily was a creator, Deco a creator....Etoo was the true finisher and he stayed away from the action as much as possible, to get himself in scoring position.

Suarez role is very different, he is obviously a target for the creativity of Messi and Neymar (despite him not assisting him) but the front 3 to me create for each other quite equally.

Dont get me wrong, Suarez is obviously the better passer and less goal hungry..but looking at the huge assist disparity does nothing for me personally. I dont feel any worse or better about either despite this new knowledge.

The thing is, though, that if Suarez didn't assist so much, but went for the goal himself, he'd have more goals. Not as many more as the number of assists, obviously, but many of his assists seem to be unselfish ones, where he could have gone for the shot himself.

As a striker I'd rather have eto'o but as a footballer, Suarez happens to be the better player and he is the more talented of both and more unpredictable too.
So Suarez, albeit slightly.

titosantill wrote:suarez imo (not basing this on barcelona, but their overall game).  as  good as eto'o was, he used to miss a lot of chances. the two seasons forlan picked the pichichi title for instance, the last couple of days into the campaign teammates were feeding eto'o and ronaldo (in the 05 season), and eto'o would just mess up the chance, same happened in the 09 season...he would score when it mattered but he used to miss a lot. technically too suarez is probably better, his passing, set piece taking, dribbling trumps eto'o's...both can succeed in almost any scenario, suarez carried liverpool, though a big club by name, they're shit without him. eto'o did very well at mallorca, i remember he was tormenting us at madrid even in those mallorca days, they were one of our bogey teams away from home, and he was instrumental in their spanish cup win...between the two temperamental geniuses, if i had a choice for i want on my team, i'd take suarez.....but that eto'o champions league goal, i can't remember against who, where he curved the ball, that goal was super

What's this thing bout strikers missing chances? Every world class striker I know or have heard of missed(es) loads and loads of these so-called "chances", it's pretty normal as long as their goal count is high, i dont know where this notion that WC strikers are spoon fed came from tbh, sometimes these players deserve credit for their unreal qualities to get into those situations in the first place, like their incredible instincts (which cant be learned), Unmatched movements, and World class positioning. heck even suarez misses more of those easy chances than eto'o did himself, RVN, messi and CR7, even R9 ffs always missed more of the easy chances too. In fact WC forwards/strikers are renowned for missing those chances and that is mostly due to their qualities I pointed out (they are so good at it that they create so many of those chances and naturally miss many of them too as a result) its just the law of averages. So, eto'o or a WC forward shouldn't be bashed for them, as long as they mostly got the job done 80% of the time. This is IMO anyway..

The Franchise wrote:I am not interested personally in who assists more. They have really different roles in the team and that will always skew everything.

Ronaldinho was a provider more than anything, he created for everyone. Messi obviously is a creator aswell as scorer, Guily was a creator, Deco a creator....Etoo was the true finisher and he stayed away from the action as much as possible, to get himself in scoring position.

Suarez role is very different, he is obviously a target for the creativity of Messi and Neymar (despite him not assisting him) but the front 3 to me create for each other quite equally.

Dont get me wrong, Suarez is obviously the better passer and less goal hungry..but looking at the huge assist disparity does nothing for me personally. I dont feel any worse or better about either despite this new knowledge.

My statement is the same without the assist stats. The stats are just there to underline a point rather than making a point based on the stats.

Eto'o would never make those passes that Suarez made to Neymar against Bayern. He'd pull the trigger himself in those 1 on 1 situations. He was quite selfish infront of goal. There was a Clasico where he literally took the ball away from Messi's foot and toepoked it into the net, I don't remember which one, I think when Ronaldinho got the standing ovation? Nothing to do with role for me since Suarez doesn't play a creator role as a false 9 or something. His assists are classic striker assists from inside the box where he has to decide in a split second whether to shoot or pass. And for me, Suarez has the unbelievable ability for a striker to make the correct decision and NOT shoot even when 1 on 1 with the keeper if a teammate is completely free and has an even better chance to tap it into the empty net. Villa for example also would take a shot and sometimes overlook passes which drove Messi mad on more than 1 occasion. It's not even a criticism. Strikers are usually like that. But Suarez has that extra awareness.

Im aware of that, no problem. I was simply stating my take on it.

Yes, Etoo was more selfish, no doubting that. He was also the last player to truly not pass to Messi just because he is Messi, irrespective of who is in the best position to score between himself and Messi. I like that.

As for the role vs assists. All im saying is they take up different areas of the field, Suarez is alot more involved and swaps positions alot more often than Etoo. He has more freedom of movement because that is his game and can do. So he would always have more chances to make  final pass, even if they had the same skill level and vision for the pass (which they obviously do not) then Suarez would still get more assists because his role is different. And also remember I am saying that each player has a role which is based on their skill, Suarez has his slightly different function as a 9 because of his type of ability, Etoo had his different funtion because of his.

Assists by themselves dont mean anything to me, all im saying.  Etoo could have had more assists by miracle and I would still say the same thing, Suarez better at setting up his teammates.

A good example of this would be Ronaldo, the real one. I am very sure Suarez has more assists, but there is also no doubt in my mind Ronaldo was an even better final passer.

A good example of this would be Ronaldo, the real one. I am very sure Suarez has more assists, but there is also no doubt in my mind Ronaldo was an even better final passer.[/quote]
Couldn't have said this any better!

It's really tight. I think Suarez is slightly better than Eto'o, but they are both really great and do a similar job for us.

titosantill wrote:  as  good as eto'o was, he used to miss a lot of chances.

He did, but mostly when goals were pointless... while Suarez seems to be more streaky and just as random at finishing.

i agree with everyone about strikers missing chances and all....suarez misses too. however, when comparing two nos 9's, i think chances missed/taken becomes quite a significant factor to look at. that said, you can't really go wrong with either striker. but i'd have liked suarez at madrid, when we didn't seem interested in getting him, and barcelona made their move, i considered it a major error on our part

Suarez all the way eto'o was tank but Suarez is more complete forward makes others look good

Eto was a beast . Suarez has a great chance in coming season to surpass it