Yeah, those seem good options too (and I'm not surprised you mentioned them). Eder having the wand-like left footed capabilities, while Brehme (like in particular Robertson, Donadoni, Cruyff, Finney from the list I made) having the advantage of great deliveries with both legs.
19:47-24:00 Between 1997 and 2002 I’d argue only David Beckham was clearly a better crosser than Rivaldo. During that period I would rank them as follows: Tier 1 David Beckham Tier 1.5 Luis Figo Tier 2 Ryan Giggs Rivaldo Pavel Nedvěd Zinedine Zidane (with crossing arguably being one of his most effective passing tools) If I had to choose one player from Tier 2 I would go with Ryan Giggs mainly because he is among the most prolific assist providers of all time with a very large proportion of his assists coming from crosses. My views on Mane Garrincha are well known on this forum and I’m certainly not acting as his defence lawyer. That said if he doesn’t rank exceptionally highly as a crosser then I’m not entirely sure how he would even make a top 500 players list of all time. Unlike Garrincha, Best didn’t need all time great crossing ability to reach his level because he was a vastly superior goalscorer. Garrincha’s case on the other hand relies much more heavily on the value of his wing play, chance creation and crossing. Frank has already mentioned Andreas Brehme. From his era Roberto Donadoni is another strong example and going back a generation earlier Bruno Conti could also be included. Bruno Conti | Around the Peninsula From players born in the last 30 years I suppose Trent Alexander Arnold is the only genuine contender I can think of.
Yeah, to give a little feedback, I always kind of felt Giggs' crossing could be a little hit and miss, but for sure when he got it on point he could be very good with them (like I say I suppose it depends how many opportunities players would get with them and he had relatively a lot I guess due to playing wide and also due to his speed and trickery as a young player), Rivaldo I had previously in an attempt at top 40 for passing/dribbling/scoring I remember but I think add crossing in too and he probably does become a clearer choice, Garrincha on a list for just dribbling+crossing would be up in or around top 10 at the least I'd think (it's hard to know his general success % though or even overall crossing assist numbers, but clearly he could be effective with floated crosses to the far post and also ground crosses to the striker, after going down the outside on the right wing).
Bruno Conti does surely belong here as well as Franco Causio. Trademark seventies Juventus offensive play was a Causio's cross for Bettega's header.
I'm not sure if this a separate topic, but are there any verified cases of a player with a greater number of assists specifically for headed goals only? Because in this discussion it seems he even outstrips David Beckham (who himself has a solid 118 assists for headed goals specifically). I counted 29 assists for headed goals out of the first 83 assists Ryan Giggs provided for Manchester United in the video below (I cannot find the part two). So maybe if that proportion holds up, he has maybe a hundred or so assists for headed goals across his entire career also.
Waddle at Marseille: how Magic Chris found freedom in France It was Waddle who famously said that David Beckham wasn’t a top 1000 premier league player of all time. David Beckham not even in top 1,000 players - Waddle - BBC Sport
I personally do not get WhoScored's classification of what constitutes a cross. TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 2-1 BRIGHTON // PREMIER LEAGUE HIGHLIGHTS // 90+6 MINUTE WINNER - YouTube The above squared pass from the left is not a cross assist according to WhoScored. MANCHESTER CITY 4-3 TOTTENHAM #UCL HIGHLIGHTS Yet the assist above from Kevin De Bruyne gets labelled as a cross-assist. So does this assist from Luis Figo count as a cross or not? Luis Figo All 87 Assists Barcelona Because apparently this assist from Ryan Giggs is not a cross assist. Ryan Giggs ALL 42 UEFA Champions League assists (most ever in history) Even stranger, for me at least, crosses does not seem to be limited to open-play, since this assist by Joshua Kimmich is counted as a cross-assist by WhoScored. BAYERN 5-1 BENFICA #UCL HIGHLIGHTS - YouTube So I have been trying to retroactively count the cross-assists for UEFA Champions League assists, since they are easier to get hold of, but the exact counts are difficult to align precisely with WhoScored standards. Does Luis Figo have 17 cross-assists, or how strict with the grounded passes do I have to be, in order to eliminate some as cut-backs or simply squared passes that end up as assists? Do set-pieces deliveries that end up as headed goals all count as crosses? If we add set-pieces, the discussion probably ends with David Beckham as the clear winner. If we limit the discussion to open-play deliveries with the component of tormenting fullbacks well enough to open up opportunities for crosses during open-play, I think the likes of Luis Figo may make the discussion much more competitive. Most UEFA Champions League Cross-Assists From 2009/2010 Season Onwards According To WhoScored: 1. Joshua Kimmich: 16 cross-assists 2. Angel Di Maria: 14 cross-assists 3. Toni Kroos: 10 cross-assists 4. Marcelo: 9 cross-assists 4. Kevin De Bruyne: 9 cross-assists 6. Franck Ribery: 6 cross-assists 7. Arjen Robben: 5 cross-assists 7. Trent Alexander-Arnold: 5 cross-assist Basically according to WhoScored, whoever is the most proficient at set-pieces delivery, gets an enormous boost.
If any deliveries from wide positions that is aimed at the head is defined as a cross, I think the career counts for headed assists becomes more of a relevant statistical metric that can perhaps proxy for general crossing ability. For example. even if Ryan Giggs has comparable numbers of open-play deliveries from wide areas than David Beckham, I noticed a lot of them tended to be more grounded in nature, with some looking more like cut-backs. RolyBF2015 on X: "According Opta Stats in the UCL era Beckham is the 2nd player with most ️ from dead ball actions (12) & All Time leader assisting header goals (18)" / X Most career assists for headed goals according to the above Twitter account: Luis Figo: 137 assists David Beckham: 118 assists Michel: 95 assists Ryan Giggs: 84 assists Diego Maradona: 60 assists De bruyne Whopping +200 Assists across Europe From a brief count, Kevin De Bruyne maybe has around 43 assists for headed goals from the compilation above. He is an amazing crosser of the ball, but seems to like aiming it lower in general, even if his delivery is aerial in nature.
Definitely seems a reasonable call (and according to Letmepost's research with numbers to back it up): like I say difficult to compare between players operating mostly wide and central playmakers who end there occasionally, but feasible to think the Michel in my attempt could/should have been him (though Platini was the better overall football player), and I kind of wonder about his team-mate Rafael Gordillo (I think it's him crossing to Michel at 0:43 on the video, and I'm showing another cross assist vs the Netherlands in 1987 as an example, but I'm more sketchy on how regular/reliable he was with his crosses to be honest generally): (around 1 minute, for the equaliser)
27 ~ out of David Beckham’s 40 assists for England were crosses for headed goals. Luis Figo’s crossing ability was completely wasted playing alongside Ronaldo Nazário even though he still managed to assist 9 of the Brazilian’s 41 non penalty goals for Barcelona in 1996–97. How many times did he get to play with Pauleta on international duty ? David Beckham never really got to play with Ruud van Nistelrooy for long enough. It would’ve been nice to have seen one or both of them playing alongside Andriy Shevchenko,Roy Makaay or with Alan Shearer (even though Beckham did link up a few times with him on international duty). The same can be said of Kevin De Bruyne wasting his crossing ability playing alongside Raheem Sterling and how many more assists would he have got playing with Cristiano Ronaldo or Robert Lewandowski. Messi spent his entire career at Barcelona playing alongside forward partners who catered specifically towards his passing strengths: Pedro, Neymar, Henry, Ronaldinho etc all forwards who could only score from chances received at their feet and all completely useless at scoring headed goals. How good was Samuel Eto’o at headers ? Luis Suárez was OK. One really great headed goal scored from outside the box against West Bromwich Albion doesn’t change the picture at all. And ignoring the fact that Ibrahimović was there for merely one season he was for his size also pretty mediocre/barely good as an aerial threat. It looks like @Wiliam Felipe Gracek is on sabbatical because he hasn’t mentioned Ruud Gullit even once in a thread where it would’ve been completely warranted.
Yeah, Gullit, particularly for right footed right wing deliveries, surely merits a mention/credit too. Also/moreso for any attempt at passing/dribbling/scoring/crossing all combined (which seems a bit too hard/extensive to think about maybe!) I think I'd have him in there somewhere anyway. I had tried a quick brainstorm attempt for passing/dribbling/crossing top 40 (but I was leaning towards crossers having priority I think; partly because it was on my mind hence the post on this thread and partly to try to deviate it from names I had for passing/dribbling/scoring when in doubt: but I think surely for example Pele would be in the mix here too still - others that came to mind were Charlie Cooke albeit I haven't seen enough footage really, Zoltan Czibor but also probably fellow Hungarians Jozsef Bozsik/Ferenc Puskas/Nandor Hidegkuti seemingly, Enzo Scifo too and probably I think of him as another who if anything could be a clearer inclusion for passing/dribbling/scoring/crossing than without including crossing which I think also for Gullit and Rivaldo....and Ladislao Kubala probably): 1 Maradona, 2 Cruyff, 3 M.Laudrup, 4 Figo, 5 Rivera, 6 Zico, 7 R.Baggio, 8 Zidane, 9 Platini, 10 Savicevic, 11 Matthews, 12 John Robertson (obviously I mean the Forest player - there was a notable striker who played for Hearts and Scotland with that name too in the 80s though), 13 John Barnes, 14 Hassler, 15 Rivelino, 16 Liedholm, 17 Dzajic, 18 Donadoni, 19 Finney, 20 Pires, 21 J S Veron, 22 Hoddle, 23 Vercauteren, 24 Deyna, 25 Skoglund, 26 Fritz Walter, 27 Best, 28 B.Laudrup, 29 Littbarski, 30 Beckham, 31 Rensenbrink, 32 De Bruyne, 33 Balakov, 34 Waddle, 35 Ginola, 36 Xavi, 37 Le Tissier, Stojkovic, 39 Jorginho (Brazil), 40 Trevor Steven.... I noticed a more extensive thread on Red Cafe just now, with various names (mentioned on our thread and not mentioned on our thread) brought into the discussion: Best Crossers of All-Time | RedCafe.net
For what it's worth I had had this as top 10 passing/crossing attempt: Beckham, Platini, Cruyff, De Bruyne, Maradona, Hoddle, Rivera, Pirlo, Xavi, M.Laudrup (other close contenders being Muhren, Zico, Figo). And this as top 10 dribbling/crossing attempt (not to mean combining both at the same time although that's always a bonus when players do that of course): Figo, Maradona, Cruyff, Matthews, M.Laudrup, Best, Dzajic, Robertson, B.Laudrup, Finney (other close contenders being Garrincha, Baggio, Donadoni).
I know it's not all crosses but he were the most consistent assist provider in the late 80s/early 90s according to transfermarkt although there's almost no data for non Real Madrid players on that period. He has number of assists comparable if not better (I didn't check) than Figo and Beckham of late 90s/early 00s. Those three were mostly right wingers who took a lot of assists from crosses/corners/set pieces. But Michel has the most assists in a single LaLiga season with 22 in 88/89 along with Xavi 08/09 and one more than Messi 19/20. I watched some of them and they were mostly crosses but I didn't find any video of "all Michel assists for Real Madrid" like people do for Zidane, Figo, Beckham, etc...
There's this Hugo Sanchez 'all goals' video that can give an idea for assists to him that season (I mean 89/90 as per video title), but it seems like it's cut from after the pass/cross sometimes and @Titanlux or @Buyo would be able to help more than me I guess in identifying (also from written sources) which were Michel assists and specifically cross-assists: I guess you've seen this one (and therefore also the caption at the start that has Michel as top player of 88/89 with points being based on votes I guess rather than ratings): There's this one too for 1987/88 (I remember looking through and noticing quite a few Butragueno assists including to Hugo that season, but also Michel had quite a few I do think IIRC, within a big total of club goals, for that era especially):
I've decided that UEFA Champions League assist tallies for headed assists is the easiest research, as well as being a reasonable proxy for general crossing threat across multiple scenarios, as defined by WhoScored (I personally would prefer crosses made during open-play to be its own entity). The tally below does not correlate like-for-like with what WhoScored counts as cross-assists (because crosses aimed for lower parts of the body counts also, with a cut-off point that I do not understand). I really have no idea where they draw the line between cut-backs, squared passes from the wide areas, and low-crosses, so this will have to do, for now. Most assists for headed goals, using primarily Transfermarkt assists for goals labelled as headers: David Beckham: 18 assists for headed goals Luis Figo: 16 assists for headed goals Joshua Kimmich: 15 assists for headed goals Angel Di Maria: 12 assists for headed goals Ryan Giggs: 12 assists for headed goals Toni Kroos: 11 assists for headed goals Alessandro Del Piero: 11 assists for headed goals Juninho Pernambucano: 10 assists for headed goals Frank Lampard: 9 assists for headed goals The list is by no means thorough, or free from mistakes. I tried to cover more ground to check for some of the names mentioned, rather than being as meticulous as possible. It seems being the designated set-pieces taker for a successful team may be a bigger factor in deciding this particular tally, than the raw crossing threat during open-play. Which sort of makes sense since headed goals occur more often during set-pieces. For example, Frank Lampard was one of the names I did not expect to be higher up than the likes of Johan Cruyff. It would be an interesting tally, to only count cross-assists made during open-play only. However, since WhoScored seems to include set-pieces assists as crosses, it seems that task would have to be based on video-compilation-review (which makes the selection of players very limited), with a lot of judgement calls made for crosses that tend to stick to the ground, or are aimed lower.
Understat is another source of reference for domestic league statistics, involving assists for headed goals. Most assists for headed goals in a single season (European domestic leagues since 2014/2015): 19/20 Trent-Alexander Arnold: 10 assists for headed goals 16/17 Toni Kroos: 7 assists for headed goals 18/19 Johsua Kimmich: 7 assists for headed goals 18/19 Angel Di Maria: 6 assists for headed goals 23/24 James Ward-Prowse: 6 assists for headed goals 21/22 Hakan Calhanoglu: 6 assists for headed goals 22/23 Kieran Trippier: 6 assists for headed goals 24/25 Michael Olise: 6 assists for headed goals I starting to think that due to the heavy presence of set-pieces delivery for cross-assists (as defined by WhoScored), and assists for headed-goals-only, this is a rather bad way to differentiate wingers who provide great crossing threat during open-play.
This video would be better for 89/90 actually: French Wiki says this (meaning top assister, and surely referring to seasons ending in those years, not full calendar years): "He was also the best passer in the Spanish league six times in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1990, 1991 and 1993." Míchel - Wikipedia On the videos I think he will have been wearing number 8 for 87/88 mostly, but then the blonde Schuster came in and wore 8 a lot himself. For some right wing deliveries it seems hard to be sure if it's Michel or not, but overall maybe (though the Twitter post Letmepost referred to perhaps disagrees?) it seems like it's not a huge percentage of his assists coming from crosses (and maybe I would feel I would have been hasty to suggest I could think he was a better crosser than Platini in theory or swap a Michel in for a Michel in my previous attempt - I would guess in terms of totals he would likely have quite a few more cross assists than Platini though indeed yeah), and also that other RM players such as Gordillo were providing many cross assists too. But French Wiki suggests surely that he would be top RM assister between mid 80s and early 90s (as seen on the videos it's clear Butragueno will have had a pretty high number in that period himself though anyway).
I suppose modern players do play a lot more Champions League (as opposed to old 'Champions Cup' i.e European Cup) games due to format of competition. But yeah I think corner takers are on one hand likely to pick up more cross assists than non-corner takers (not necessarily but it gives more scope for it), even if their crossing accuracy numbers might even suffer because of taking a lot of corners (often the defensive team will make the first contact).... I was discussing with @Al Gabiru on his thread about crossing stats/definitions lately and yeah I'm not sure myself which exactly will be counted as crosses and which passes when balls are played from wide into the area (in effect some deliveries are kind of both, but wouldn't be classed as such; generally I'd have thought ground balls to near post which are in effect passes and don't open a scoring chance ought to be passes, and also chipped balls into penalty area that give possession to the attacker intentionally but weren't aimed to give a scoring chance could be classed as passes but I couldn't be sure...and I guess deliveries to far post or in front of goal even if low-ish or ground balls perhaps would be deemed crosses for stats purposes and the likes of De Bruyne and Beckham would have a good amount of those in career for example).
From the numbers above, maybe we can estimate the open-play cross assists. Assists from set-pieces scenarios: Luis Figo: 86 assists (30.5%) David Beckham: 78 assists (31.2%) Michel: 52 assists (23.5%) Assists from open-play scenarios (proportion of crosses within this count unknown): Luis Figo: 196 assists David Beckham: 172 assists Michel: 169 assists Considering that Luis Figo still has 137 assists for headed goals, I'm assuming his open-play cross numbers are still quite prolific. I personally think there's still a chance that Luis Figo ranks high as a provider of cross-assists during open play also, on top of being a deadly set-pieces delivery specialist. He is the player with the best combination of on-the-ball penetration and precise aerial delivery that I've personally witnessed.
I think if anyone manages to do a separate count for set-pieces cross-assist rank, that might include the likes of Trent Alexander-Arnold, or Joshua Kimmich, I might prefer that over lists that clumps various styles of crossers into one. I think the list below explains why Frank Lampard made it into one of my provisionary lists before Johan Cruyff did. Every Trent Alexander-Arnold Premier League assist 2019/20 And if one was to make a separate list for open-play cross-assist specialists such as Kevin De Bruyne, who becomes more outstanding after we selectively analyze open-play scenarios only, that might give lists with two completely different profiles of players. Kevin De Bruyne 19/20 ALL ASSISTS I personally think Kevin De Bruyne deserves to be included in your lists, the speed with which his whipped crosses arrive at the intended destination before defensive formations have time to react, separates him from some of the other crossers. The potency of his crosses, especially during open-play, when the speed of the delivery in relation to the defensive formations matters most, is about as deadly as they come.
Yeah, I suppose not all the set piece assists have to be for headers (see example below), but most will be I guess: UNREAL Paul Scholes Volley - YouTube If those stats can be trusted (he seems well respected on Twitter anyway doesn't he, including among fellow stat-collectors like @Trachta10 ): [does he break them down season by season at all though?].......then Michel has 169 from open play and Beckham 172, but Michel's count for the assists on header goals minus set piece assists would be 3 higher than Beckham's (43 compared to 40). It's hard to just compare on stats though I suppose, without looking at the goals (but clearly Michel did have some impressively played in from wide on the wing), and what we wouldn't know just from stats is the number of attempted crosses (aiming to tee up a player to score) and also the state of the defence (how free the striker is, how many gaps in the area etc). It could be suggested Beckham's much higher free-kick goals tally reflects his ball-clipping accuracy advantage, but then again it depends who else is available to take free-kicks and also it's well possible to excel much more with crosses than with free-kick shots still.... EDIT - Those stats don't show how many of the assists were open play crosses to the boot rather than the head of course (I'd guess Beckham could have more of those played to far post area and Michel more cut-backs played along the ground perhaps).
A pedidos: as 41 assistências registradas em vídeo do Marcelinho Carioca no ano de 1994.No total, foram 45, além de 33 gols do meia-atacante na temporada de estreia pelo Corinthians.Os lances com registro apenas escrito:3 x 1 Ponte Preta*2 x 0 Flugels*7 x 4 Bellmare (2x)* pic.twitter.com/riJD8pnvtd— Tomás Rosolino (@TomasRosolino) December 2, 2025
I guess maybe this is the breakdown: A1: Open-play crosses to non-headed goals A2: Open-play crosses to headed goals A3: Open-play assists which are not crosses, that assist non-headed goals A4: Open-play assists which are not crosses, that assist headed goals B1: Corner-kick crosses to non-headed goals B2: Corner-kick crosses to headed goals B3: Corner-kick assists which are not crosses, that assist non-headed goals B4: Corner-kick assists which are not crosses, that assist headed goals (such cases don't exist?) C1: Free-kick crosses to non-headed goals C2: Free-kick crosses to headed goals C3: Free-kick assists which are not crosses, that assist non-headed goals C4: Free-kick assists which are not crosses, that assist headed goals --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Essentially, A1+A2 is the figure I wish to have. I do not know of any site that gathers this figure as its own entity, or any amateur tallying attempt that stays aligned with WhoScored, whilst further classifying cross-assists into separate categories. With A4 assists, there are definitely assists to headed goals, whilst not being classified as assists by WhoScored (and thus OPTA?). Below is an assist classified as a long-ball instead of a cross. Robin van Persie Header | FIFA Puskas Award 2014 FINALIST - YouTube I don't think B4 assists exist. I cannot for the life of me think of a corner-kick assist that assists a headed goal, and not get classified as a cross. I cannot think of examples of C4 assists that lead to a headed goal, and still not be classified as a cross. Maybe there are examples of a lobbed long-ball freekick pass, that assisted a headed goal. Although we know the assists to headed goals (137) by Luis Figo, and also his set pieces assists (86). If we take away 86 from 137, we get a weird number that isn't really representative of anything. We are just hoping A2 (open-play crosses to headed goals) takes such a massive portion that it somehow approaches A1+A2. (A2+A4+B2+B4+C2+C4) - (B1+B2+B3+B4+C1+C2+C3+C4) = (A2+A4) - (B1+B3+C1+C3) It isn't really possible to precisely infer what I want from the data-sets currently available.