Great post Tom (with excellent knowledge about South American oldies ) You said it very well, that uruguayan team is a forgotten team, with great players, unknown for non-SA countries fans. The base was Nacional from Montevideo (7 starting players), who won the uruguayan title from 1939-43 (Quinquenio de Oro), in 1944 they loss vs Peñarol in a play-off. Nacional was the best SA club at early 40s (a powerful one), but sadly for them his peak come in war era and placed between the arguably two better South American clubs in pre-war era: Independiente from late 30s (Erico, Sastre, De la Mata) and The Machine in the 1st half of 40s. (see the matches between ARG-URU club champions those years) http://www.rsssf.com/sacups/aldao.html
Do any of our South American posters know anything about Atilio Garcia's situation with the Uruguayan national team? He was Argentinian but was capped 5 times for Uruguay, all in CA 1945 where he had a strong tournament scoring 5 times in 5 games. Why was he not included in the team sooner? From what I have read as early as 1940 he was already considered the best player in the Uruguayan league. Was Varela thought to be better and Garcia did not get a chance until CA 1945 when Varela was playing for Boca and not considered for the team? I know they are both legendary players but I am not sure who was thought of as better. It seems like they should have been able to play together in the early 40s as well. Was their some type of delay in Garcia being naturalized or becoming a citizen in Uruguay? Did Argentina ever consider capping Garcia in the 40s? I know they had a wealth of attacking talent but he would seem to fit right in at the same level as Labruna etc.
It wanted to give this thread a bump and see if we could get some European Championship discussion going. I am going to go ahead and try to throw out my top 10 for each tournament to get some discussion going. I will admit that I am not very confident in these top 10s especially the older ones, so feel free to let me know if I am way off from public opinion, match ratings, or your opinion. I welcome all input. Anyone who could pull together some rating would be great (France Football and kicker along with anything else out there). 2012 1. Andea Pirlo 2. Andes Iniesta 3. Cristiano Ronaldo 4. David Silva 5. Xabi Alonso 6. Daniele De Rossi 7. Mesut Özil 8. Cesc Fàbregas 9. Sergio Ramos 10. Pepe HM: Jordi Alba, Steven Gerrard, Zlatan Ibrahimović, Sergio Busquets, Mario Balotelli, Iker Casillas, Luka Modrić 2008 1. Xavi 2. Marcos Senna 3. Andrei Arshavin 4. David Villa 5. Luka Modric 6. Wesley Sneijder 7. Fernando Torres 8. Bastian Schweinsteiger 9. Lukas Podolski 10. Carles Puyol HM: Andrés Iniesta, Yuri Zhirkov, Michael Ballack, Iker Casillas, Cesc Fàbregas, Roman Pavlyuchenko 2004 1. Wayne Rooney 2. Theodoros Zagorakis 3. Traianos Dellas 4. Pavel Nedvěd 5. Ricardo Carvalho 6. Jon Dahl Tomasson 7. Henrik Larsson 8. Zinedine Zidane 9. Maniche 10. Milan Baroš HM: Antonios Nikopolidis, Vladimír Šmicer, Ruud van Nistelrooy, Cristiano Ronaldo, Luís Figo, Frank Lampard 2000 - Lots of good performances top 10 is strong all the way through, a lot of HMs were tough to leave off. 1. Zinedine Zidane 2. Luís Figo 3. Edgar Davids 4. Francesco Toldo 5. Francesco Totti 6. Alessandro Nesta 7. Patrick Kluivert 8. Thierry Henry 9. Patrick Vieira 10. Frank de Boer HM: Laurent Blanc, Marcel Desailly, Lilian Thuram, Fabio Cannavaro, Rui Costa, Dennis Bergkamp, Raul 1996 1. Matthias Sammer 2. Karel Poborský 3. Alan Shearer 4. Davor Šuker 5. Laurent Blanc 6. Paul Gascoigne 7. Jürgen Klinsmann 8. Miroslav Kadlec 9. Dieter Eilts 10. Marcel Desailly HM: David Seaman, Tony Adams, Didier Deschamps, Andreas Köpke, Oliver Bierhoff, Pavel Kuka, Radoslav Látal, Rui Costa, Paolo Maldini, Youri Djorkaeff, Steve McManaman 1992 1. Peter Schmeichel 2. Henrik Larsen 3. Thomas Häßler 4. Brian Laudrup 5. Tomas Brolin 6. Jürgen Kohler 7. Dennis Bergkamp 8. Flemming Povlsen 9. Karl-Heinz Riedle 10. Thomas Ravelli HM: Frank Rijkaard, Patrik Andersson, Laurent Blanc, Jocelyn Angloma, Marco van Basten, Ruud Gullit, Andreas Brehme 1988 1. Marco van Basten 2. Frank Rijkaard 3. Ruud Gullit 4. Rinat Dasaev 5. Oleg Kuznetsov 6. Ronald Koeman 7. Alexei Mikhailitchenko 8. Lothar Matthaus 9. Giuseppe Bergomi 10. Oleh Protasov HM: Anatoli Demianenko, Olaf Thon, Jürgen Kohler, Franco Baresi, Paolo Maldini, Jan Wouters, Vasyl Rats 1984 1. Michel Platini 2. Alain Giresse 3. Jean Tigana 4. Antonio Maceda 5. Chalana 6. Preben Elkjaer-Larsen 7. Morten Olsen 8. Luis Fernandez 9. Maxime Bossis 10. Joao Pinto HM: Frank Arnesen, Soren Lerby, Michael Laudrup, Santillana, Jose Antonio Camacho, Rui Jordao 1980 1. Karl-Heinz Rummenigge 2. Bernd Schuster 3. Jan Ceulemans 4. Wilfried Van Moer 5. Horst Hrubesch 6. Harald Schumacher 7. Hans-Peter Briegel 8. Gaetano Scirea 9. Eric Gerets 10. Karlheinz Forster HM: Manfred Kaltz, Dino Zoff, Claudio Gentile, Klaus Allofs, Uli Stielike For final tournaments that only included four teams I am going to go ahead and make a ranking that includes quilifying, wiht more importance given to the finals. 1976 1. Antonín Panenka 2. Jaroslav Pollák 3. Franz Beckenbauer 4. Ivo Viktor 5. Dieter Müller 6. Anton Ondruš 7. Ruud Krol 8. Dragan Džajić 9. Zdeněk Nehoda 10. Branko Oblak HM: Ján Pivarník, Marián Masný, Rainer Bonhof, Willy van de Kerkhof, Rob Rensenbrink, Johan Cruyff, Josip Katalinski, Arfon Griffiths 1972 1. Gerd Müller 2. Gunter Netzer 3. Franz Beckenbauer 4. Raoul Lambert 5. Uli Hoeneß 6. Murtaz Khurtsilava 7. Viktor Kolotov 8. Wilfried van Moer 9. Paul Van Himst 10. Dragan Džajić HM: Ferenc Bene, Lajos Kocsis, Revaz Dzodzuashvili, Roberto Boninsegna, Giancarlo de Sisti, Johan Devrindt, Paul Breitner 1968 1. Dragan Džajić 2. Angelo Domenghini 3. Giacinto Facchetti 4. Luigi Riva 5. Bobby Charlton 6. Sandro Mazzola 7. Ilija Petković 8. Ivica Osim 9. Albert Shesternyov 10. Yozhef Sabo HM: Petar Zhekov, Vladimir Durković, Martin Peters, Bobby Moore, Dino Zoff, Mirsad Fazlagić, Pierino Prati 1964 1. Amancio 2. Luis Suárez 3. Jesús María Pereda 4. Valentin Ivanov 5. Flórián Albert 6. Ferenc Bene 7. Lev Yashin 8. Ole Madsen 9. Viktor Ponedelnik 10. Ferran Olivella HM: Ignacio Zoco, Valery Voronin, Dezső Novák, Lajos Tichy 1960 1. Igor Netto 2. Valentin Ivanov 3. Dragoslav Šekularac 4. Bora Kostić 5. Viktor Ponedelnik 6. Lev Yashin 7. Milan Galić 8. Josef Masopust 9. Jean Vincent 10. Ladislav Novák HM: Raymond Kopa, Jean-Jacques Marcel, Vladimir Durković, Titus Buberník, Just Fontaine, Alfredo di Stéfano
I repped you for the good list, but some comment: 1- 2012: CR7 was not #3 best 2- 2004: Rooney was not the best player there (baros should be in TOP3)
Going back and looking at this in more detail. A number of major teams did not participate namely Italy, England, and West Germany. Although these are very big names they were not at theirs historic peaks. Italy had failed to qualify for WC 58 and did not make it out of the group stage at WC 62. They were in a clear low point in their nations great soccer history. England were a solid team at this point but were still recovering from losing a number of their top players at the Munich Air disaster and would have fielded a very young squad. Germany would have been a very interesting team to see, especially because Uwe Seeler was at his absolute peak, coming off his greatest club season ever. Would have been great to see him play in a wide open high scoring tournament like this one. Another Disappointing thing about the tournament was Spain dropping out after the first round. They had peak Suarez, Gento, and Di Stefano really looking strong beating Poland 7-2 over two legs with ADS scoring three times. If they would have gotten past the Soviets in the next round they would have had a great chance to win the tournament. It could have been ADS chance to really make a big mark on the International Stage for Spain, the one thing missing from his great career. Looking at my top 10 list I already want to make some changes. Looking back at the USSR and doing some more reading, Yashin is consistently mentioned as their most important player and was the star of the final, where Yugoslavia outplayed the USSR by a significant margin but could not translate their dominance into goals due to some fine saves from the famous keeper. The other important victory for the USSR was the confident win over the Czechs in the semifinal, I could not find any info specific to that match but I am assuming Ivanov was excellent scoring twice. I also suspect their were some excellent defensive performances with the Czechs scoring 14 goals in their three other games in this tournament. Overall I would keep the same 4 Russians in the top 10 with Yashin moving up and maybe adding a defensive player like Anatoli Maslyonkin or Yuri Voynov to the honorable mention. For Yugoslavia I feel like I definitely need to add Jerkovic somewhere as he was one of the main proponents of the great comeback verses France. Overall from what I have read Dragoslav Šekularac was their star player and chance creator. He is often named as their top player in both the final and semifinal. Galic and Kostic are famous, important players who scored important goals throughout the tournament but I am not sure exactly how good they were in 1960. Ranking France was tough. Their offensive players performed well in the semifinal but they were missing their stars Kopa (ankle injury) and Fontaine (broken leg). With these players France could have easily won the tournament, as they were both still in top form before their injuries. Jean Vincent appeared to play very well in qualifying and was one of their offensive players to perform well in the semi final versus Yugoslavia to I gave him the edge over Kopa and Fontaine. I am not sure if this is the right move because where France really impressed in the tournament was in qualifying especially versus a good Austria team which they beat 9-4 over two legs where Kopa and Fontaine were big factors (Vincent was as well). Do not know much about the Czech team and who really stood out for them. They had a relatively easy qualifying easily beating Bulgaria and Romania. They were beaten convincingly in the semi-final by the soviets and then one the third place game versus a likely demoralized and undermanned France side. Ladislav Novak and Josef Masopust were the two players that made the retroactive UEFA Team of the Tournament. Thought about including Coluna in honorable mention for his strong performance versus East Germany in qualifying. This could have been a really great tournament ever with the absences of Italy, England, and Germany if France could have stayed healthy for the finals and Spain would have continued in the tournament. An amazing final to image would have been the two high scoring sides and star power of France and Spain facing off with prime Kopa, Fontaine, Vincent, and Piantoni going against Di Stefano, Gento, and Suarez.