We've got almost 2 weeks now to ruminate, speculate, click on betting choices and the reconsider, before the final of the UEFA Champions league comes up! Today we check out some of the all-time records of UEFA - best clubs, longest streaks, and most impressive players.
Club records
- Real Madrid still holds the most UEFA Champions League cups (9, along with 3 runners up), and their wins are fairly evenly spread into the noughties as well as across the 50s, 60s and 90s.
- AC Milan has won the second-most UEFA Champions Cups - their most recent of their 7 total cups (along with 4 runners-up) were in 2003 and 2007
Country records
- As you'd expect, Spain holds the record for the country with the most Cup winners - Real Madrid contributed 9, and Barcelona 3.
- Italy and England tie for 2nd place in the country stats, with 11 cups each.
- However, England also has the second-greatest number of clubs in the competition, with 7 major clubs and 9 minor. So they have a much larger pool to draw from than either Spain or Italy!
- Germany has the greatest number of teams from a single country - 10 major, 7 minor.
Semifinal Soldiers
There are a couple of clubs that are fantastic at making it to the semi-finals … but seem to choke a little when it comes to going the full distance! Looking at the top four clubs by number of semi-finals appearances, you'll see:
- Real Madrid (21)
- Bayern Munich (13)
- AC Milan (13)
- Barcelona (12)
However, looking at the winner's scoreboard, Bayern Munich and Barcelona are under-represented in wins compared to their numbers of semi-finals.
Unbeaten streaks going on to win the Cup
As so often happens in soccer, a side can hit a magical winning streak, and blitz every one of their UEFA Champions League matches before going on to win the cup. In fact:
- AC Milan, Liverpool, Manchester United and Ajax have each twice won the trophy without a loss to their name in the season.
100% Finals Success Rate
A very unexpected statistic here! We've heard plenty about Real Madrid and AC Milan, but the only two teams to have a 100% success rate in the finals are actually Nottingham Forest (won in 1979 and 1980), and Porto (won in 1987 and 2004).
Players
Here are the top goal-scoring players in the UEFA Champions League for all time. Well, since the 1992/93 season, anyway!
- Raul has scored 66 goals for Real Madrid in the past 18 years
- Ruud van Nistlerooy has scored 54 goals, for PSV, Man U and Real Madrid
- Thierry Henry has scored 50 total, playing for Monaco, Arsenal and Barcelona
Ruud van Nistlerooy actually has the highest goal ratio, as well, scoring an average of 0.74 goals a game in UEFA Champions League, compared to Raul's 0.51. In goal ratio terms, Filippo Inzaghi comes second, with 44 goals from 78 games and a ratio of 0.56.