Wednesday, June 11, 2008

EURO All-time most scoring players

With one goal against Italy (albeit in a clear off-side position), Ruud Van Nistelroij has equalized the legendary Marco Van Basten with five goals, in the number of goals scored in the UEFA Euro finals of all time.
In fact, the table of all time scoring players in the UEFA Euro finals is probably going to go through some changes soon:
  1. Michel Platini, France, 1984, 9 goals
  2. Alan Shearer, England, 1996 and 2000, 7 goals
  3. Patrick Kluivert, Netherlands, 1996 and 2000, 6 goals
  4. Marco Van Basten, Netherlands, 1988, 5 goals
  5. Savo Milosevic, Yugoslavia, 2000, 5 goals
  6. Milan Baros, Czech Republic, 2004, 5 goals
  7. Nuno Gomes, Portugal, 2000 and 2004, 5 goals
  8. Thierry Henry, France, 2000 and 2004, 5 goals
  9. Zinedine Zidane, France, 2000 and 2004, 5 goals
  10. Ruud Van Nisterooij, Netherlands, 2004 and 2008, 5 goals
  11. Jurgen Klinsmann, Germany, 1988, 1992 and 1996, 5 goals
Michel Platini's achievement of 9 goals in 5 matches, as the tournament was much smaller then, is probably never going to be beaten. Nevertheless, as can be seen from the table, there are some players in this year's tournament which are contenders to the second and third spots, of Alan Shearer and Patrick Kluivert respectively: Milan Baros, Nuno Gomes, Thierry Henry and Ruud Van Nistelrooij are all in the current tournament with 5 goals.
Of these however, only Van Nistelrooij and Nuno Gomes seem with good possibilities, since
Milan Baros has had a poor season and barely starts in for the Czechs, while Thierry Henry is still dangerous but playing on a French team that seems more and more tired and demotivated.
And well, then there are other marginal players who may enter the list after this Euro: David Villa, or Cristiano Ronaldo or Lukas Podolski, depending on how their teams do in the tournament the coming weeks!

No comments: