- Lionel Messi
- Alfredo Di Stéfano
- Cristiano Ronaldo
- Pelé
- Johan Cruyff
- Ferenc Puskás
- Eusébio
- Franz Beckenbauer
- Xavi
- Franco Baresi
I have to say, this is extremely tough — much tougher than the usual all-timers list. Pelé's & Maradona's international career makes it much easier to create a normal list and then there's Cristiano who I don't like to put too high on those lists but his club career is almost impeccable...
Lionel Messi: peak, longevity, success at both continental and domestic football; while his claim to be the absolute GOAT comes a bit short for me due to his international career, club-wise I think he's pretty much unmatched
Alfredo Di Stéfano: lacks even a resemblance of a proper international career (even though he had managed to win a South American Championship), but club-wise he's almost unmatched. Seamlessly replaced Pedernera at La Maquina, absolutely dominated the money-filled Colombian league and then, of course, his stint at Real Madrid
Cristiano Ronaldo: his club career is incredible, especially in continental competitions. I'm not the biggest fan but I think club-wise he's almost unmatched. He's also probably the most influential player in Champions League's history...
Pelé: I'm probably underrating him a bit but I really struggle to place all of the guys who deserve to be absolutely up there. I'm probably struggling due to my European bias
Johan Cruyff: I do think that maybe he slightly lacks in pure longevity at an all-time level... but he was so key in forming both Ajax & Barça's identities and even has that successful feck you story with Feyenoord later on
Ferenc Puskás: just complete domination everywhere he played; if European Cup was introduced sooner, I wonder how placed higher up this list he would've been — as things stand now his Hungarian stint where he was at his absolute peak is almost non-existent in public's perception
Eusébio: I wouldn't place him in my overall top-10 but club-wise he was absolutely humongous. It's quite ridiculous that he had only won one European Cup but let's all blame Guttmann's curse for that
Franz Beckenbauer: I actually have some issues with his club career since at some point his Bayern decided to ignore domestic football more or less altogether. In continental competitions they were massive and, of course, the general standing of Bayern as German's number one club has a lot to do with him. It's a shame that Müller doesn't make my top-10, he's obviously very close to Kaiser in terms of his influence but I had to pick one
Xavi: the most influential midfielder in club's football history? He certainly beats Matthäus on this one
Franco Baresi: had to pick someone from that Milan side and I'm going to give credit to Baresi's crazy longevity. Maldini was an option too (and he also caught some of the 00's success) but I rate Franco a notch higher overall
Honorable mentions (and why they haven't made it):
Diego Maradona: longevity, mostly. For quite a long time he was the next big thing a bit like Neymar — his early games in Argentina shows you just how special of a talent he was but it was Argentina (so, a minus from the pro-European bias point of view), he was really good at Barça (but not properly all-time good) and then comes Napoli where his 2 league titles and UEFA Cup are among the biggest achievements of any footballer on a club level... but ultimately it wasn't a decade and a half of pure domination
Michel Platini: I can't even say why not. He easily could've made it but spending a lot of his younger days in France and more or less switching off after Heysel kinda hurt his legacy when he competes with the absolute monsters from the list above
Zico: again, European bias + maybe a bit of an issue with his longevity?
@oneniltothearsenal will be certain to correct me if I'm wrong on that
Gerd Müller: I had to pick one from the German pairing and picked Kaiser
Paolo Maldini: same as with Müller
Bobby Charlton: with only 5 major trophies he shouldn't be that high up the list but we all know the story
Gianluigi Buffon: absolutely synonymous with Juventus and stayed even for the Serie B stint... maybe Neuer can challenge him for the most influential club goalkeeper of all-time?
Rivera,
L. Suárez and
Iniesta would probably make up the rest of my top-20
