Best ever World Cup Finals/Best Team?

[ramAnag]

Actually I hated Maradona at the time. I was especially happy he got sent off in 1982 as Brazil beat Argentina.
I actually think Tele Santana's teams were the best ever Brazilian teams. Bloody exciting to watch.
Back to Maradona, I hated him not so much the cheating. Yeah the 1986 goal was scandalous. But I hated him because he had the cheek then to say he's better than Pele.
As a young teen then, having more or less 'religiously studied' Pele, I thought it 'sacrilege' for Maradona to claim to be the GOAT.
Pele was the Ali of football and Ali was the Pele of boxing.
However with the passage of time, I think maybe Maradona has a point.
Unfortunately I saw little of Pele as a player except in his final years, only via books and videos which isn't really the same thing as watching a player in a live match.

So I cant honestly choose between the 2 and am comfortable to accept views of those who describe Pele as the GOAT. But definitely by a narrow margin I'd say Maradona is the best I've seen. Zidane would be 2nd and as I mentioned before I'm also considering Cristiano in this category.

Books...no. Videos? Except where promotional agents’ material is concerned...exactly the same.
We only remember the extremes...the best and the worst bits...so whether it’s Pele or Maradona, Moore or Beckenbauer, Cruyff or Best, Banks or Yashin etc, the ‘video’ is just as reliable as the memory...perhaps more so.
Ronaldo, I agree, has to be up there...as talented as any of them but again flawed...he’s a big guy who falls to the ground feigning injury far too often to warrant the respect his talent deserves. Similarly with Suarez...great talent but let down by his ‘character’.
That is what makes Pele stand out, his character seems to match his talent...that is why he and not Maradona has such world wide heroic status imo.

It wasn’t ‘cheek’ to lay claim to being ‘better than Pele’...it was arrogance. The best don’t need to make such self indulgent claims...others will do it for them.