Is it just me who reacts a little bit to the word legend and how it has totally lost its proper meaning. That is the beauty part of language and words in general. It is the users of a language that decides what the meaning of a word should be. The word legend is a word I feel has lost its credibility and strength. Why? Because it is overused.
You can see it everywhere.
“Inter won against Juventus, what a miracle!”
Unlikely, yes. Miracle, no. An example for a miracle would be something like: Piano falls on lame grandma. She has mixed feelings about the situation. You lift the piano, grandmas back got fixed by the impact, she can walk again and wins New York Marathon. That’s a miracle. Is a miracle really anything but surreal amount of luck?
I hope so. My point is, that if you overuse a strong word and superlatives, it loses it’s context. Same with curse words and other words we use to give our statements more power.
“Potato-chips are so damn good!”
That an enhanced strength to your sentence and you get your point across a bit harder and confirms how good potato-chips really are. But if you would say.
“Holy shit, god damn, it is so damn fucking good with these damn potato-chips”… you’ve totally lost your listener and all the curses loses its basic function.
But let’s talk about legends. So-called Inter legends. How many men have really earned the honorable title? From the top of my head, I can only think about two. Giacinto Facchetti and Javier Zanetti. These two are not even up for discussion to be anything but legends, because they have personified what Inter is all about, both on and off the pitch. Then, we’ve got the glorious year of 2010 (glorious, not legendary) when the win in the Champions League where done. Diego Milito and José Mourinho came up sniffing for the legend status, but didn’t really reach all the way. Marco Materazzi is my all time favorite, but it is something that just keeps him away from the peak of the legendary Nerazzurri-throne. Then we have a lot of players that are called legends, but isn’t in my book. Ronaldo, a legend of course, but not in Inter. Figo, no. Eto’o, no. Maicon, no. Ibrahimovic, are you kidding me? Sneijder, no. Cambiasso, no. People even spoke about Lucio as a legend. Do you become a legend because you play well for one season? Then play like a sack of garbage the other two seasons and then leave for Juventus. Are you a legend because you played for Inter 2010? In the case, Christian Chivu is a legend as well. Davide Santon a legend? Of course not. To be called a legend you need so much more than titles. Let’s look back a little further. Armando Picchi is a candidate. Picchi who died at only 35 years old after playing 257 matches for Inter. Sandro Mazzola did 417 games in the black and blue shirt. And not a single game in another club. These two are very close, but I don’t know. The same goes for Helenio Herrera, the coach that did what Mourinho then came to repeat about 40 years later. I don’t know. Who do you think deserves to be called a legend?
I ask you two more questions? Would Facchetti and Zanetti both have gotten their legendstatus if they played at Inter at the same time.
Next question: After Facchetti, the number three were taken of and nobody will play with number three again. Will the number four be retired as well when Javier Zanetti hangs up his jersey?
I dont know if number 4 will be retired, but number 3 was retired after Facchetti’s death, not when he stopped playing football!
Jag själv tillhör den nostalgiska skaran och använder mig, säkerligen enligt vissa, av ordet legend väldigt generöst. Facchetti är vår störste legend, utan tvekan. Han var en enastående fotbollsspelare, unik i sin samtid, gentleman på och vid sidan av planen och framför allt – en symbol för Inter, den ultimata bandieran.
Javier Zanettis nummer 4 kommer givetvis att pensioneras. Kanske inte när (om?!) han slutar spela, men en dag kommer det att ske. Varför? För att han är en bandiera och en legend. Han har många likheter med Facchetti: gentlemän på och vid sidan av planen, långa karriärer i Inter. Skillnaden mellan de två är att Zanetti inte är lila nyskapande som Facchetti var utan har levt på mångsidighet och uthållighet, vilket inte gör tar ifrån honom legendstatusen.
Behöver en spelare vara den bäste på sin position för att bli en legend i en klubb? Nej, för mig räcker ett stort hjärta för klubben och en lång karriär innehållande med- och motgångar. Jag vet att kanske inte många håller med men för mig är spelare som Walter Zenga, Nicola Berti, Giuseppe Bergomi, Marco Materazzi, Esteban Cambiasso, Ivan Cordoba, Ivan Zamorano och, någon många inte håller med om, Dejan Stankovic. Visst har det funnits bättre spelare i Inter under denna tid såsom Ronaldo, Zlatan Ibrahimovic och Vieri men deras kvaliteter på planen har varit större än deras känslor för Inter. Det har med andra ord inte bara med hur bra spelare var/är att göra.
Sandro Mazzola är en legend. Det han gjorde för Inter går inte att förneka. Armando Picchi är en legend. Det går inte att lämna kaptenen från La Grande Inter utanför denna lista.
Ämnet är dock intressant och visst kan det vara så att ordet leged blir urvattnat om det används för mycket, men för mig som supporter är det ett sätt att tacka och hylla spelare som älskar samma lag som jag.
No doubt the 4 should be retired… Sme will complain about losing a commercial chance..