Top 121 Great Player Quotes

You have to do more than the coaches ask you, or you’ll never be a great player in this league.

There is no comparison between the two of them. The debate will always be there and you have to respect Cristiano. It would be foolish not to respect him. He is a great player. But whoever likes football will think Leo is the best.

Pogba is a great player and left Juve by his own decision. It makes sense that he is singled out at any club – and even more so at United.

I’m not out here just for the money. I want to be a great player.

It’s great to be compared to a great player like Tracy McGrady, but I think I’m my own type of player. I’m 6’10” and a bit bigger than he is as a player. I also think I’m a bit different and play a different position. He’s more of a guard, and I can play all around through five.

Baresi was not tall but he was a great player, while Cannavaro was the best defender in the world – hopefully I will be the same.

Pogba has never stopped improving. He has everything to become a great player. If he keeps his head on his shoulders, he can make history.

Sometimes you’ll get a player who’s marking you tightly, and he’ll even apologise and say, ‘My coach told me to stick close to you and mark you. I know you’re a great player.’ But I tell him it’s fine and to do what he has to do.

You talk about Shaq, I would put Tim Duncan in that same category. Mr. Fundamental, just kept things simple. He is a great teammate, a great player, and a great person. When you have those ingredients in a champion, you just want to be a part of that and have an opportunity to play with him.

If I follow the media and everyone that tries to set expectations for me because I’m a high draft pick, if I follow that, I will never become a great player.

For me, I think the toughest player I came up against was Messi; he’s out of this world, he’s a genius. For me he’s the best in the world, a great player and I think he’s the toughest opponent I’ve played against.

It’s not a good feeling when you get booed. But I don’t want to be good because somebody booed me. I want to be great player because that’s the way I am.

The great thing for me is I wasn’t a great player – I managed at the lower level and managed to be successful and that gives great hope to everyone else.

A big reason why you take a chance on a 34-year-old who has bags of experience, is a great player is to pass that on to your younger players.

To be a great player and a great scorer, you have to find ways to get yourself open and get shots off. It’s a dog fight.

Tom Brady is a great player who can beat you.

Dez Bryant’s a great player. You can’t take that away from him.

I played against Maradona and he was a great player like Messi too.

Coutinho is a great player, and I am sure he will stay at Barca for a long time.

Lukaku is a great player.

Pogba is a great player.

I’m not all about winning rushing titles, or ‘Me, Me, Me,’ but I do believe that I want to be a great player in this league, and I want to go down as one of the best to play in this league, and that’s something you got to do.

Yaya is a great player, a top player that plays in every part of the role.

Kobe is probably an idol for so many players. He was such a great player so you wanted to be like Kobe. He’s a legend that never dies.

Cristiano is a great player with incredible quality, and if he joins Madrid, then he will be welcomed.

I think of myself as a great player, but the fans have to decide whether that’s true.

Bernard is a great player, a player for the Brazilian national team, and I also followed his progress with Atletico Mineiro.

Coming in, I wanted to be a great player, and right now at the beginning of my career, I’m showing some slight sunshine that I can be the player I want.

Ozil is fantastic. One of the best in the world. Not only a great player but a great human being.

Guardiola has never been a great player; he was just a good player.

LeBron is a great player, he’s the MVP for a reason, he’s one of the best to ever play this game.

Kara Braxton, she’s a great player, so I think they can go far this year.

David Silva is a great player, and also, off the pitch, he’s a great lad.

Tom Brady is a great quarterback, he’s a great player, and what you’ve seen with him is he’s gotten better every year.

To be a great player or a good player in the NBA, I have to work on my perimeter game.

To have a great player like Neymar at PSG would be a great honour. He’s a phenomenal player, and to have great player is a great thing for the team.

I want to be a great player. I don’t want to play for the money. I don’t want to play for fame. I’d just as soon no one knew who I was. I want to play football because it’s football.

Judge me all you want as a player. Some people think I’m a great player, some people don’t. That’s fine. Numbers don’t ever lie.

I just want to be a great player.

I hope to become a great player.

To become a great player, you’ve got to show real dedication and commitment to football, and you’ve got to be very humble and hard-working. And, above all, you’ve got to fight to make your dreams come true.

Dembele is a great player.

Cazorla is a great player.

Josh McEachran is a great player.

For all that Michael Jordan could run, jump and entertain, he is best known for one thing: He won. If you want to be a great player in this league, you have to focus on one thing – the bottom line, which is winning.

Giannis is such a great player.

The World Cup is a very important way to measure the good players, and the great ones. It is a test of a great player.

I respect opinions, I don’t give opinions on them. I learnt to respect them. And I also have a very clear opinion on Rivaldo. He was a great player and the image that comes to me is of him controlling the ball on the chest and scoring in Barcelona. The most beautiful thing in this world. That’s my opinion.

Just as the great composer is seldom also a great player, so is the great mathematician seldom also a great teacher.

Umtiti is a great player, and we expect him to stay at Barca for many more years and for him to enjoy his football with us.

Every great player has a big character. I don’t know any player with a lot of quality who just has quality – you have to have an ego and character to be the main person on the pitch.

Cristiano Ronaldo joined United a year after me. He was ultra-confident, with the talent to back it up. He was dedicated, too, and practised as hard as anyone after training. You could tell that he wanted to be a great player, the greatest.

In football, in any sport, communication is really key. So if you want to be a great teammate, a great team and a great player, then communication is very important.

I’m just playing basketball. I just want to be a great player. That’s it. That’s all I’m thinking about. If the other stuff comes, it comes, but I’m just fortunate to play in the NBA Finals and just to play basketball, period.

Mesut is a player who needs the pressure a little bit. He needs the pressure to perform. He is a great player. He is everything that you need in his position when he plays No. 10. He can play the pass and he can score.

The great player, so much of the greatness, in my mind, is in his heart and his head. It’s not in his body, in his skill set. It comes from having great talent but wanting to mold that and fit it together into being special. And being special means winning championships.

Coutinho is a great player, he will help Barcelona to reach their goals.

Wenger gave me the opportunity to be where I am today. He’s a coach that helped me a lot, who gave me a chance, who’s always been there for me in the bad moments. He called me, consoled me, gave me good advice, told me what I had to do to become a great player. I can only thank him.

David Luiz is also a great player. More than anything he’s a great guy off the pitch too.

Paul Pogba is a great player.

Lewandowski is a guy who scores goals for fun and he is a great player.

If you are not born a Ronaldo or a Kaka, you can still become a great player through commitment, serenity, perseverance, loving what you do.

Lampard is a great player, not only for Chelsea, but in world football.

Joe Mauer’s the real deal. He is absolutely wonderful. Not only is he a great player, but he’s a great human being. He’s the kind of guy you’d like to see… be your son.

Messi is a great player. Playing against him is not good – it is bad.

Ozil is a great player. He’s the brain of the German national team.

Eric Clapton was such a great player. He sounds like he’s Freddie King or someone like that. He plays the roots of blues and Delta blues. He really affected me with the way that he plays, because he never really plays that many notes.

I didn’t have many celebrity crushes, it was mainly Rangers players! I had a thing for Giovanni Van Bronckhorst. Looking back, I really don’t know why! Great player though!

I want to be a great player someday.

If I got a chance to play with another great player, I want to do that. I mean, the objective is to win.