Top 10 Footballing Legends

In no particular order, I have picked out, in my opinion, the ten greatest footballers in history.

Not included are those who are still in the middle of their careers today because I felt it wouldn't of been a fair judgment of their overall contribution to the game as a whole.

So for the sake of this article, the sportsmen within are retired–their legendary status cemented.

Pele

( 23 October 1940 - present )

Pele is the all-time leading scorer of the Brazil national football team and is the only footballer to be a part of three World Cup-winning teams.

Since his retirement in 1977, Pele has been a worldwide ambassador for football and scored 578 goals in his career for club and at national level.

He is best known for his time at Santos. Despite numerous offers from European clubs, the economic conditions and Brazilian football regulations at that time enabled Santos to keep Pele for almost two decades.

Maradona

( 30 October 1960 - present )

Former Argentine football player and finishing first in an internet vote for the FIFA Player of the Century award, Diego Maradona is best known for his "Hand of God" goal while, in the same game, his second goal was a spectacular 60-meter weave through six England players, commonly referred to as "The Goal of the Century".

Maradona captained his national side all the way to World Cup glory. Best known for his periods at Boca Juniors and Napoli, Diego scored 345 goals in all competitions during his career.

Johan Cruyff

( 25 April 1947 - present )

Named European Footballer of the Year three times with a goal tally of 326, Cruyff was the star of the exciting 1974 Dutch philosophy of "Total Football", the Ajax team that won a hat-trick of European Cups in the early Seventies and by far the most naturally gifted European player of his generation.

Cruyff became synonymous with the playing system "Total Football" where a player who moves out of his position is replaced by another from his team—no footballer is fixed in their intended outfield role; anyone can be successively an attacker, a midfielder and a defender.

Cruyff played centre forward in this system but he would drop deep to confuse his markers or suddenly move to the wing which was an unknown practice in football at that time.

Franz Beckenbauer

( 11 September 1945 - present )

This list would not be complete without "der Kaiser", Franz Beckenbauer, who was the mainstay of Bayern Munich’s triple European Cup winning team of the mid Seventies.

He also captained his country to the 1974 World Cup and as a manager, he steered the German national side towards their 1990 World Cup win in Italy also which cements his status as a member of the Soccer Hall of Fame. He scored 95 goals.

Alfredo di Stéfano

(4 July 1926 - present)

Di Stéfano is best known for his time at Real Madrid where he was an integral part of one of the most successful teams of all time as he scored a club record, 216 league goals in 262 games.

Known to have the ability of playing anywhere on the pitch, the Argentinian dominated the European Cup, winning the competition for five consecutive seasons from 1956. Total career goals reaches 406 which is why Spain has proclaimed his service to Spanish football as their "most outstanding player of the past 50 years", an award given to him by the Royal Spanish Football Federation - "The Golden Player".

Zico

(3 March 1953 - present)

Often called the White Pelé and without doubt, one of history's greatest free kick specialists, the Brazilian accumulated 515 goals during his prolific career and is best remembered for his club, Flamengo, which he played for a total of 579 times.

According to Pele, generally considered the best footballer ever, "throughout the years, the one player that came closest to me was Zico".

Ferenc Puskás

(2 April 1927 – 17 November 2006)

Legendary Hungarian footballer and manager, Puskás scored an unprecedented 84 goals in 85 games and won Olympic Gold for being an integral part of a team which went four years unbeaten.

Puskás fled Hungary in the wake of the Soviet invasion of 1956. His highest accolade at international level was being in the first ever team to defeat England at Wembley.

At his club, Real Madrid, he was recognized as the top scorer of the 20th century by the IFFHS, putting in 509 goals in 523 games throughout his colourful career.

Enzo Francescoli

(November 12, 1961 - present)

Scoring 188 goals in his career, Enzo's infamous years were played at River Plate and is named as one of Pele's top 100 greatest living footballers.

Known as "The Prince", his style of play influenced French midfielder Zinedine Zidane, who has stated that Francescoli was his favourite player as a young boy and even named one of his sons Enzo.

He is also the most capped outfield player in Uruguayan international football.

George Best

(22 May 1946 – 25 November 2005)

Northern Irish professional football player, best known for his years with Manchester United as the infamous winger.

In 1968, he won the European Cup and was named the European Footballer of the Year having been said to have the ability to "talk with the ball".

He was one of the first celebrity footballers, but his extravagant lifestyle led to problems with alcoholism which curtailed his playing career and eventually led to his death in November 2005.

During his career, he scored 213 goals.

Eusébio

(25 January 1942 - present)

Virtually single-handed taking Portugal to third place in the 1966 World Cup, scoring nine goals, Eusébio scored 727 goals throughout his career, winning the European Cup with Benfica.

In 2004, Eusébio was named in the FIFA 100 list and was given the award at UEFA's Jubilee for Portugal's most outstanding player of the past 50 years.