the 20 most successful football clubs in the world

His criteria was 100% spot on in his 1st post.

 

based on a healthy weighting between league titles, domestic cups, cups and finals in europe, and iccs, it is clearly:

real madrid
ac milan
liverpool
bayern/ajax
inter
barca
united

if liverpool had defeated ac milan in 2007, given their greater haul of european trophies compared with milan, they would have become the second best side in history. now milan has that slot sewn up for the next few years, as have real in no1 spot. united had 6th spot till 2010, now down to 8th.

in terms of leagues, i think we are back to spain then italy then england in terms of clubs trophy haul, but im not sure if england are equal to italy or ahead. given inters cl last year i think they may be ahead of us again. spain have pushed themselves a good few trophies ahead of the rest of us over the last couple of years.

you can quote whatever you want about south america clubs but we all know they are shit and lose all their best players to europe every year.

 

Any list that don't include Flamengo is a joke.

The most popular team in the world, the biggest winner in the brazilian championship and where most of the greatest players of brasilian soccer history already played.

 

My list

1. Real Madrid (Spain)
2. Boca Juniors (Argentina)
3. AC Milan (Italy)
4. Flamengo (Brasil)
5. FC Barcelona (Spain)
6. Penarol (Uruguay)
7. Juventus FC (Italy)
8. River Plate (Argentina)
9. Bayern Munich (Germany)
10. São Paulo (Brasil)
11. Manchester United (England)
12. Arsenal (England)
13. Inter Milan (Italy)
14. Independiente (Argentina)
15. Liverpool (England)
16. Nacional (Uruguay)
17. Santos (Brasil)
18. Ajax FC (Holland)
19. Internacional (Brasil)
20. Cruzeiro (Brasil)

 

I think people are confusing "greatest" with most "successful." The greatest club in African club history is just as "successful" as the greatest club in European or South American club history. A true list would just name the top 10 (or whatever cutoff you want) from all the continents.

If you named the greatest, then you could start creating criteria. Everyone's criteria would be just as valid as anyone else's because it is just an opinion.

The Club World Cup and the Intercontinental Cups are just not universally accepted enough competitions to definitively crown the best club in the world. Nobody argues that the European Champions League crowns Europe's best team for that year; plenty of people argue against the international cups.

I view them more as some sort of international version of a country's domestic cup or the European Supercup. I could argue that the English FA cup is the best measure for success in England, but it would just be my opinion and its not accepted by enough people.

 

Flamengo should have more international titles to be considered amongst the elite clubs though.

 

Is that why they led europe in world titles from the 70s till just last year? Please. If the top euro teams had to come to South America, they'd shit their pants.

Well, that's what it was designed for. It's champion vs champion at a neutral site. You tell me a better way.

 

isnt having a passport enough these days? now you have to adopt the local customs as well?

the talent drain goes in 1 direction and pretty much alway has, other than the bogota league in the 50s and the north american league of the 70s.

 

For many years brazilians teams didn't care about Libertadores, and different than Boca and River that always plays Libertadores, brazilians teams have to fight alot in the national level to be able to play the tournment. As you can see Boca and River played almost 3 times more Libertadores than any Brazilian team. Soccer is not just about titles.

 

This makes no sense, the Argentine championship is tougher to win than the Brazilian one. Top to bottom, the Argentine clubs are better than their Brazilian equivalents. Boca during the Bianchi era would have dominated the Brazilian championships.

 

I agree that the argentinian league is difficult, but u cant compare to brazilian league. In Brazil there are 12 big clubs, in Argentina there 4 or 5 at most...Just take a look how many brazilians teams already were national champions and compare to Argentina...for many years the AFA guarantee Boca and River in South American competitions...almost 30 brazilians teams already played Libertadores...

 

I already answered this on another thread in this forum - it was also raised by a brasileiro. I don't know if I agree that there are more big clubs in Brazil than in Argentina, but even if this is true it is very difficult to be a big team on a league featuring Boca Juniors and River Plate. If these two were in the Brazilian league, the other clubs wouldn't be so big anymore - they would be in exactly the same situation as Independiente, Estudiantes, San Lorenzo, Racing, Velez, Newell's are.

 

Boca and River have theirs sizes today because of the lack of others big teams. Makes no sense imagine Boca and River as brazilians teams...The point is: championships are not the only item to measure teams sizes, especially if you are comparing team from different countries.

 

Independiente is not a big team? Do you know what their trophy cabinet looks like, there is a reason why they are called "rey de copas".

The two Argentine giants are bigger than the rest, including any Brazilian team, not just because of what they won, but because of the legacy that some of their sides created - River's La Maquina and La Maquinita, and their perpetual youth academy. Boca with the mystique of being the team of the people, the underdogs against the "millonairos" who beat them more often than not, plus the number of international cups won and players that have worn the shirt - you do need both to reach the level of becoming a world-renown club.

 

Did i say that Independiente is not a big team?

hahah ok than i must stop discuss, do u really think that Boca and River are bigger than any brazilian team because of that? Do u know about the legacy that Flamengo left to soccer? Tatical legacy for the 50s, strategy legacy for the 80s Claudio Coutinho team in Brasil 78 and 82...not to talk about the players, Zico, Junior, Leandro, Romario, Leonidas, Zizinho, Garrincha, Ronaldinho, Fillol, Zinho, Bebeto, Raul, Leonardo, Pirilo, Friedenreich, Zagallo and etc etc etc etc etc...Dont forget, Flamengo supporters outnumbers all the Argentina population...

 

Many of these players were neither raised by Flamengo nor had any significant seasons with the team. Also, you are comparing number of supporters between two countries with a difference in population of over 150 million.

 

hahaha man you dont what are u talking about, only Ronaldinho or Garrincha dont have significant season in Flamengo, the others are great players of Flamengo history, and this players are just a few of many others as Carlos Alberto Torres, Gerson, Jair Rosa Pinto, Julio Cesar, Adriano, Andrade, Dida, Valido, Volante, Renato Gaucho, Vanderlei Luxemburgo, Domingos da Guia, Evaristo, Claudio Coutinho, Nunes, Carlinhos, Juan and etc etc etc, and i wont talk about others sports.

I compared the supporters of differents countries as u compared numbers of championships from teams in differents countries and completely differents scenarios.

 

Hmm?

River, Boca, Racing, Independiente, San Lorenzo (the big fives), Estudiantes...these six are massive ones. A level below these come Newell's, Argentinos, Rosario, Huracan, and Ferro Carril Oeste.
That's 11. A few more I probably forgot. Plus, no Brazilian team is probably as big as River, Boca and Independiente.

I am not intending to belittle Brazilian championship. Its massive, and I think both Argentinean and Brazilian leagues are probably equally strong. Also, I agree that Brazil got more parity overall, and has more number of quality teams. But that should be pretty obvious given the area of the country and its relative population (compared to Argentina).

 

the size of a club has many factors. River today has 90,000 socios and puts 50,000+ in the seats without exception even when we finished dead last in the standings.

we have 33 national champions. we only won 2 libertadores, but then again juventus only won 2 Euro Cups and Barcelona's Euro success is all recent. None the less, River's 2 libertadores is more than flamengo and you're first came in 1982 and our in first came in 1986, so don't give me any crap about brazilian teams not caring for a while and thats why Flamengo only has 1

we have many players who have succeeded outside of the country and won league titles all over the world. You may have heard of the greatest idol in Real Madrid history, Alfredo Di Stefano, and the greatest in Juventus history, Omar Sivori, both started with River.

Our list of idols includes Labruna, Pedernera, Muñoz, Moreno, Loustau, Di Stefano, Carrizo, Sivori, Cubilla, Pipo Rossi, Passarella, Luque, JJ Lopez, Filliol, Beto Alonso, Kempes, Francescoli, Pumpido, Perfumo, Gallego, Alzamendi, Almeyda, Gallardo, Ortega, Crespo, Salas, Sorin, C. Ayala, R. Ayala, Aimar, Saviola, D'Alessandro, Cavenaghi, and now we have the best youth products in the world once again with Lamela, Lanzini, Pereyra, Cirigliano and more. River regularly wins the lower levels in argentine futbol

The size of our club also reaches far beyond our boarders. In addition to having the best academy in south america to produce talent and sell it abroad, we have importanted great players from uruguay, chile, colombia, and paraguay to increase our popularity abroad. Francescoli, Alzamendi, Salas, Cubilla, C. Ayala, Alexis Sanchez, Juan Pablo Angel, Falcao, Mario Yepes, and many more... There are "filliales" of River in the miami, nyc, mexico city, Colombia, Chile, Montevideo, Isreal, Spain, italy, quito, el salvador, hondorus, costa rica, lima, and many more. Almost any person with a knowledge of soccer has heard of River. A brazilian guy posted a blog on here (his name is SoccerScout an Inter fan) and he went around asking people to name Brazilian clubs at the US vs. Brazil friendly, and half the crowd couldn't even name a single brazilian team, the few that did knew Santos because of Pele. the bottom line is no one outside brazil cares or knows anything about flamengo. you can't even watch the brazilian league any where outside of brazil in south america. i go to my local soccer shop and there are river and boca jersey's for sale i've never seen a flamengo one

and don't go on about the argnetine league not being hard, or do you not realize that small teams like ARgentinos Juniors, Velez, and Estudiantes have all won the libertadores AFTER the period when you claimed brazilians starting caring. In this supposed period that Brazilian clubs didn't care about the libertadores, the only clubs that would suffer would be the uruguayans who at the moment, a team like penarol couldn't play in the third division of argentine futbol as seen by their performance against a reserve independiente team that also finished last in the apertura.

 

Rosario Central is the 6th biggest team in argentina. even though they are in the B, they have 50,000 socios... they have way more fans than Estudiantes

 

I know. The reason i mentioned Estudiantes is because the argument was mainly based on the number of titles won. Estudiantes' Libertadores record is pretty solid, something that Rasario can't claim.

 

hahhaha man im sorry but compare River to Flamengo is almost a joke. Boca is a giant team but River is only big and that is all. River has 2 Libertadores and played 30 times...Flamengo has 1 and played 10...River is the best academy in SA? i hope you prove that. You wrote about socios, Flamengo has 35 millions supportes. Flamengo and River shared for a long period the sames sponsors, Petrobras, the company paid 23 millions reais to Flamengo, something about 14,5 millions dollars a year, nowadays Flamengo dumped Petrobras for a sponsors almost twice this value, and how much Petrobras pays to River? 2,5 millions dollars? a fair price for River size...

 

Historically, River probably has the best football academy in the world, let alone South America.

Look at the names they produced.

In the forefront you have Cherro Moreno, Pedernera and Di Stefano. Then you have the whole host of fellas like Sivori, Onega, Bernabe Ferreyra, Peucelle, Pipo Rossi, Carrizo, Onega, Oscar Mas, Ortega, Beto Alonso, Diaz, Laustou.

It would be no exaggeration to say that 1 out of 4 (or even 3) Argentinean great you name probably came from the River academy.

 

Boca is a giant team? do you know anything about argentina or our futbol? the three highest rated futbol matches in argentina last year were River games (river vs. boca, banfield vs. river, river vs. independiente)

you say you have 35 million supporters, how many are socios? how many go to games? River had 20,000 AWAY supporters vs. Godoy Cruz last season in a place 600 miles from Buenos Aires... how many fans do you take to away matches? how many do you take to the libertadores in uruguay? or paraguay?

best cantera in south america? ok- the south american player of the year is from the River cantera (Andres D'Alessandro). The best player in your league (Dario Conca) is also from River. The greatest idol in the history of Real Madrid (Aflredo Di Stefano) is from River. If you want to talk recently, in the last 5 years players from River's cantera have won league titles in: Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Chile, Mexico, Spain, England, France, Italy, and Portugal. The Argentina U20 team had 6 players from River, and they wanted 9 but we refusted to release our 3 best youth players. Portugal player of the year (javier saviola) from river, real madrid's leading scorer from last 2 years (higuain), the leading scorer in portugal atm (falcao)

When we won our last league title in 2008 7 of the 11 starters were from our cantera.

on river's financial situation, well i'm not going to make excuses, we got sucked dry by our last president and we never should have signed with petrobas, we were fine with who we had before. anyway, the money paid by petrobas to us has more to do with the dire situation in argentina than it does with River's size, and the fact that you comment on river and say it isn't a massive club tells me you have never been there and you don't realize the magnitude that is river... flamengo is starting to sound a lot like boca to me, claiming they have a certain amount of fans, the majority of whom are villeros who don't own a tv and don't have enough money to go to the stadium so it doesn't matter who they support

honestly man i used to like flamengo until i started reading this nonsense youre posting... flamengo is not a great club, end of story. since 1981, you have 1 libertadores, we have 2. we also won the super copa beating sao paulo in the final, you haven't won that ever, in fact you lost to independiente in the final. you also have the distinction of handing CASLA (club atletico sin libertadores de america) their first international trophy in 2001. the bottom line is i don't care how many fans you have, or how many rio state trophies you have, or "how little you cared about the libertadores in the 60s" you have the same amount of libertadores as liga de quito and once caldas, end of story. win another one and we'll talk

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IFFHS_continental_Clubs_of_the_20th_Century

looks like they forgot to add flamengo