wessy wrote:You and i make the assumption due to height that he would not play in today's game, he may well have proved us both wrong, your making an argument to fit the post that's fine but the thread is who do you think would be rated number two and EH wins hands down.
Once you mention Howard and Matthews in the same breath as Eddie you simply lose the arguement.
Why are you comparing generations and then dismissing what they achieved because the games moved on (yes you said he was good in his time) but then dismiss what they achieved.
End of the day it's about opinions, one thing is for certain if you did a poll of best goalscorers BWFC fans would to a man say Nat Lofthouse , not one would have any present day striker in that pole.
It's a bit like saying Ovett and Coe were not one of our best middle distance at 1500 runners because Farah ran faster times in that event
It's all about context.
Hopkinson was a great keeper in his age, one of the very best but we all know that he would not be given a chance these days.
Our current defenders tower over him by almost a foot and the size of players both in and attack during corners would totally dominate and block him out of being in anyway effective.
You even stated your opinion that he wouldn't be picked in todays games - so you can't have it both ways that he couldn't get into a team that Matthews played in this season just gone, whilst at the same time say he's a better keeper than him - those two statements conflict with each other do they not?
Time moves on.
You can be the greatest of your generation but not get in the squad fifty years later with the same size and physicality you have.
Ovett and Coe were our best 1,500m runners 40 years ago and maybe with modern diet and training they could compete if they were born in the current generation of runners but Hopkinson is simply several inches short of even being considered to be a keeper these days.
Let me try to give you some context England's women keeper is Karen Bardsley and she is taller than Hopkinson at 5ft 9 inches - and I don't know if you watch the women's game but the keepers look like a pea on a drum, the goals are clearly too large for them. Alisson at Liverpool who is 6ft 3 inches and fourteen and a half stone makes the goals look tiny in comparison, that because it is not just about height but also someone who is that much taller has arms and legs that are commensurately longer too - they get to places small guys/girls simply aren't able to reach or cover.
Alisson - even Matthews - are able to reach crosses and shots that Hopkinson in his prime simply physically could not.
That's just the way it is.
No disrespect to Hopkinson at all, and if he were alive today I'm sure he would happily say the same.
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