I read through again and it seems GS put an emphasis on former/current or new acquisitions that play in Italy. I think B. Laudrup wasn’t mentioned because he had not been taken into account for Fiorentina until after Denmark won the title.
Just saw it again but France Football gave Gough the highest average of anyone. He played three games; the top six in the ranking played five; Brolin, Eriksson and MvB had a high average too but played four. I understand it's subjective but find Schmeichel his ratings also comparatively low, although two of his marquee games are still to come (the semi final and final)... I thought/think Schmeichel was a potential player of the tournament and not many keepers in history can say this. Many indeed thought Rijkaard was the outstanding player of the match, helped by playing as defender for one half and then also as midfielder for one half. Both at a high level. They get that one right (or according to the 'consensus'; MvB and Bergkamp also receiving their praise, with strong grades by GS next to the high-in-form guy Hassler). Helped of course to score the opening goal that set the train rolling. I've said it before a few times but I think Rijkaard was the most consistent national team player of that generation, from ~1984 until his retirement, also by his own commentary (he was also the best or least worst of his team in 1990 imho). He often came up big with goals or assists at important matches, in the semi final too. For me definitely in that 3 to 9 group of 'greatest' players of his country and was demonstrably influential for the results. There have been matches where the staff/organization was a chaos and he still makes the best out of it. P.S. Many people called up the state broadcaster and complained about an off-air comment by the anchor after the match. "Can you please ask whether those people can be quiet? If they want to stand there, ask if they want to mute, it's inconvenient. Unless it are Germans, then you can shoot them down. Sorry."
Semifinal: Denmark 2-2 Netherlands (Denmark won on PK’s) Man of the match: Larsen 7,5 Worst: Van Basten 4
Don't see how Schmeichel can have only a 6.5 and the fairly incisive Bergkamp only a 6. As shown on the video of post 19 (from 25:00 onward).
That's an interesting team with some marked differences to the 'official' team of the tournament or the team voted by journalists. The ratings you have posted above support this observation in bold, with gaps of 1.5 points for Laudrup and a gap of 1 point for the NED match. To me the outstanding semi finalist players of this tournament were the bright young Brolin, Schmeichel, B. Laudrup (especially the semi final and final), joint topscorer Bergkamp, Rijkaard and the agile free kick specialist Hassler.
They have included all the players with two goals or more, except joint-topscorer Bergkamp somehow (who was in the 'official' team and media team, finished #3 in BdO and #2 in WSpotY). Per their own grades he did significantly better than Kanchelskis (of CIS/USSR) and Hassler in the direct head-to-head duel. This are seven players with two goals. The four remaining players (without two goals) are Schmeichel and the defenders Gough, Andersson (1 goal) and Kanchelskis.
It is interesting observations. Also, what was the best Danish side: this one or the one between the periods of 1984-86? Although they won, the 1992 side may not have possessed the star power of the calibre of Preben Elkjear or Michael Laudrup (even though his brother played well too). They seemed more pragmatic. Some people may not know nowadays, but in 1985 (I mentioned this years ago) Elkjear was being hyped by some to the point that he was being spoken in the same sentence of Cruijff, Platini or Maradona. There was apart from WC86 this one game at home vs the Soviets in 1985 for the qualifiers, where Elkjear and Laudrup destroyed the Soviets, at a time when the Soviets seemed unbeatable. Rarely had I seen a Soviet team of that generation suffer such a demolition at the hands of an opponent. I think the great Lobanovsky had to take over the helm for the Soviets shortly after for the WC.
In personnel the 1982 to 1988 side was arguably the better one. They had more players who won the European Cup, more players winning the UEFA Cup, and the same number of players with the Cup Winners Cup medal. The 1992 side had still some good players. In the qualification they famously finished behind banned Yugoslavia, but less famous is them still winning 13 points in the qualifiers, in not a particularly easy group. Only France, Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union (CIS) and Netherlands did better in qualifiers. They rode their luck in the tournament (see that video I posted, from 25:00 onward), with a fortunate handball in the final, and capitalized on obvious tactical errors by France, Germany and Netherlands (Rijkaard had a goal and assist in the semi final match, but couldn't be on two places at once); at the same time you don't get past all of England, France, Netherlands and Germany just on sheer luck. They didn't lose any of these games. Compare this to Italy at the 2006 World Cup for instance: a relatively easy draw and they didn't beat any of the best three teams they faced (a penalty shoot-out against Germany was only avoided at the very end). They didn't beat a single good team in normal time. Denmark did (against France). Many of those players, plus Michael Laudrup, also went on to win the (minor) Confederations Cup in 1995. The 1986 was entertaining and won all their three group games (the 1992 only one, although you can say it was a significantly harder group), but in my observation also very vulnerable when coming behind and having to make the play yourself (not only the famous Spain game at the World Cup, but for example also a friendly against a not too great Netherlands team where they were demolished 6-0).
This is the ranking of the players with the best tournament average, using the ratings of the newspapers for which I have the ratings given to them. Next, and based on those averages, an ideal XI proposal. It is quite similar to that of Guerin Sportivo, but quite different from the official one.
What about adding Mundo Deportivo? (which you did for 1988) L'Unita and La Repubblica aren't the same paper right?... The voted team by the media was (organized by Reuters): Schmeichel (Denmark), Kohler (Germany), Olsen (Denmark), Eriksson (Sweden), Andersen (Denmark), Hassler (Germany), Rijkaard (Netherlands), Bergkamp (Netherlands), Brolin (Sweden), Povlsen (Denmark), Laudrup (Denmark). Hassler, Laudrup and Brolin formed the podium in a separate media vote for the Golden Ball by sponsor adidas. https://library.hungaricana.hu/hu/view/PestMegyeiHirlap_1992_06/?pg=398&layout=s https://leiden.courant.nu/issue/LLC/1992-06-29/edition/0/page/13
In this Eurocup, El Mundo Deportivo did not numerically qualify the players. Regarding the Italian newspapers, I got that information from another thread in this forum; in some games there are double ratings, so I suppose that it was indeed two newspapers. The number of "étoiles" of France Football I think you put them. This team you mention also closely resembles the one I suggest from the averages. The one that departs a lot is Kholer who gets an average rating of 6.05.
Larsen for GS with an exceptional average rating... Mate, what other tournaments have you tackled besides these Euros you mentioned ?
Not to forget, that Denmark had just voted no to the Maastricht Treaty (the Treaty on European Union), on the 2. June 1992, but then became European Champions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_Danish_Maastricht_Treaty_referendum Or as the Danish Minister of Foreign Affairs Uffe Ellemann-Jensen said at the EU top meeting on the day of the Euro-92 Final against Germany, > "We are going to win, because as we say, if you can't join them, beat them": <
The basic stats for euro 1992 (again: this is devoid of further context like team style, fatigue etc.): Topscorers: Riedle, Bergkamp, Brolin and Larsen all with 3 goals. Assists: Rijkaard, Koeman, Povlsen, Sammer and Christian Perez all with 2 assists. Shots on goal per game: Klinsmann 1.6; Bergkamp 1.5; Kennet Andersson 1.5 Successful dribbles per game: Kolyvanov 5.0; Merson 4.5; Brian Laudrup and Povlsen 4.2 (Roy 4.0) Chances created per game: McAllister 4.0; Van Basten 3.8; Hassler 3.8 Saves percentage: Schmeichel 87.1; Goram 81.3; Kharin 79.0 (Van Breukelen 75.0) Pass accuracy: Andy Moller 95.1; Helmer 90.1; Kuznetsov 89.3 (Rob Witschge 87.2) Individual duels won percentage: McPherson 73.1; McStay 70.3; Rolan Nilsson 69.4 (Wouters 56.2) Winning possession per game: McStay 15; Schwarz 11; Brehme 11; Van Tiggelen 9 Fouls per game: Platt 4.0; Buchwald 3.3; Dahlin, Amoros, Deschamps, Angloma, Andersson at 3.0 (Van Tiggelen and Van Basten 2.8) To be included a player had to play at least 2 games, sent 50 passes and have 25 duels at a minimum. All in all this is really fascinating at times. Who would have thought Scifo was the 2nd highest successful dribbler of the 1994 World Cup? (as well as 2nd best chance creator; 2nd best in winning possession). Bergkamp was one of the better dribblers at euro 2000 (frequency and accuracy)? Joker substitute Robinho loses the least balls if he wants to move it to another player at the 2006 World Cup? (Robinho came three times in the field at the 70th, 72th and 79th minute; played the full game against Japan and didn't play against Ghana). Midfield schemer Moutinho had the highest pass accuracy in 2008? (ahead of Gallas and Xavi). Van der Sar is in three tournaments among the top keepers with the best save percentage? Brian Laudrup is by the way the top dribbler at euro 1996. Apparently OPTA counts this (1:10) as a Sammer assist for Effenberg.
Are all the matches included in these averages? The numbers from Unità/Repubblica are a bit strange: Schmeichel's 6,43 and Brian Laudrup's 6,71 suggest that they played seven games in this Euro, but they actually played only five. What's the explanation?
Someone on this forum posted the ratings of these two newspapers, but they were probably not complete, which is why I decided to merge them into a single average. I will see if I can locate that post and post the link for you.
Excellent! Thanks a lot! I will publish averages team by team, including also Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet's ratings.
Including all the available sources, these are the top rated players in this Euro: 6,68 Thomas Häßler (BRD) 6,67 Richard Gough (Sco) 6,66 Frank Rijkaard (Net) 6,59 Henrik Larsen (Den) 6,58 Des Walker (Eng) 6,56 Tomas Brolin (Swe) 6,55 Dmitri Kharine (CIS) 6,49 Peter Schmeichel (Den) 6,48 Dennis Bergkamp (Net) 6,47 Stefan Schwarz (Swe), Jean-Pierre Papin (Fra) 6,44 Henrik Andersen (Den) 6,43 Brian Laudrup (Den) 6,37 Flemming Povlsen (Den) 6,36 John "Faxe" Jensen (Den) 6,35 Paul McStay (Sco) 6,33 Jan Eriksson (Swe) 6,32 Rob Witschge (Net)