Selecting a Best XI from Bayern Munich, Barcelona and Real Madrid
European Champions Real Madrid are the top club in world football, according to the 2016/17 UEFA club coefficient rankings, with Bayern Munich and Barcelona not too far behind in second and third, respectively.
With 82 domestic league titles and 21 European Cup/UEFA Champions League triumphs between them, the trio are rightly regarded as being three of the greatest teams in world football.
Fourth in UEFA's list, Atletico Madrid were able to move past Barcelona and then Bayern on the way to last year's Champions League final, in which they lost to Real on penalties in Milan. But although they have the same points as Barca, it was the Catalans who won LaLiga last term, and Atletico have never taken Europe's top prize.
Who would make a combined starting XI, then, if you were allowed to combine the squads of Real, Bayern and Barca for the day?
Goalkeeper: Manuel Neuer
1 of 11
One of the simpler picks on this list, Manuel Neuer was in imperious form as Bayern wrapped up a record fourth consecutive Bundesliga title last season. Neuer played all 34 games and only conceded 17 goals—one every 180 minutes—as Bayern finished 10 points clear of Borussia Dortmund.
Real's Keylor Navas might provide the most competition for Neuer, but Kiko Casilla has been preferred to the Costa Rican so far this season. Claudio Bravo, meanwhile, has recently departed Barcelona for Manchester City.
Even if the goalkeeping status quo had been maintained at the top two in Spain, Neuer conceded fewer goals than either Navas or Bravo in 2015/16, and the FIFA World Cup winner's ability to play as a "sweeper-keeper" makes him stand out from the crowd yet further.
Right-Back: Philipp Lahm
2 of 11
Philipp Lahm is helped in his cause by another Barcelona departure, with Dani Alves having joined Juventus, but his claim for a starting berth is a strong one, nonetheless.
Danilo's Real conceded 34 goals in La Liga last term—more domestically than either Bayern or Barca—and Lahm, despite his 32 years, remains integral as ever to the Bavarians.
"He is the only right-back in the world who can dominate play from his position," Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola—who has worked with Alves and Lahm as coach of Barca and Bayern—told Sport Bild (in German). "He always plays well. I have not seen Lahm play a single poor game over the past three seasons."
Centre-Back I: Sergio Ramos (captain)
3 of 11
Where Lahm might lead by example, Sergio Ramos is a defender who takes the game by the scruff of the neck. Ten yellow cards, as well as two sendings off, in LaLiga last term tell the story of a player who sometimes lets his passion spill over, but there can be no doubting Ramos' flair for the big occasion.
Real only conceded six goals in the Champions League last season—eight fewer than Bayern—and with most lenses trained on Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale in the final, it was Ramos who opened the scoring at the San Siro with a textbook bullet header.
Atleti's Yannick Carrasco scored to force extra-time and then penalties, but Ramos converted his spot-kick confidently and was rightly rewarded with the 14th major honour of his senior professional career.
Centre-Back II: Mats Hummels
4 of 11
There is plenty of competition among Ramos' potential central-defensive partners, with Gerard Pique and Javier Mascherano having strong claims, as well as Bayern's Jerome Boateng and Ramos' clubmate Raphael Varane.
It is nigh-on impossible to leave Mats Hummels out though. Where Varane was enduring criticism for fluctuating form last season and Boateng's frequent visits to Bayern's medical staff, Hummels was captaining Dortmund to a Bundesliga points-haul that would have delivered the title to Signal Iduna Park in all but four of the previous seasons since the league's inception in 1963.
A reported €35 million homecoming to Bayern followed in the summer, and the prospect of seeing Hummels re-establishing the defensive triumvirate he forms with Boateng and Neuer for Germany at club level is mouthwatering.
Left-Back: Marcelo
5 of 11
One of the most keenly contested positions in this thought experiment, Barca's Jordi Alba and Bayern's David Alaba have coherent cases.
However, neither enjoy the same attacking output as the Brazilian, who scored two goals and assisted three as Real missed out on what would have been a record 33rd league title by a single point.
Marcelo was also named in the UEFA Champions League squad of the season at the expense of the other two, and, while he might get lost high up the pitch more often than Alba or Alaba, the defensive talent in this dream team would more than compensate.
Defensive Midfield: Sergio Busquets
6 of 11
A water-carrier par excellence, Sergio Busquets is the unsung hero of the Barcelona team. Xabi Alonso may have recorded a Bundesliga record 204 touches as Bayern beat Cologne in September 2014, but Busquets' numbers are just as impressive.
Only Real's Toni Kroos and Rayo Vallecano's Roberto Trashorras averaged more than Busquet's 69.2 passes per game in LaLiga last season, and he kicked off many a Barca attack with his 2,316 passes, 67 interceptions and 73 tackles in his 35 league games.
The long-term successor to Alonso and Xavi in the Spain team, Busquets says his role is: "more about being tactically astute than physically dominant: thinking, calculating, offering solutions, defensively and offensively," as per the Guardian. Little wonder his Barca release clause was raised to €200m in May.
Central Midfield I: Arturo Vidal
7 of 11
Few players in the game combine Arturo Vidal's steel and silk so well. A box-to-box midfielder, Vidal scored nine goals and assisted 11 in all competitions as Bayern romped to the Bundesliga title in 2015/16—which was his fifth consecutive domestic league title after four in a row with Juventus.
His Copa America triumph with Chile in the United States in June was his second in as many summers, and the way he helped quell Lionel Messi's magic in each of those finals lends weight to the claim that Vidal is the most complete midfielder in the game.
Central Midfield II: Toni Kroos
8 of 11
Toni Kroos boasts passing figures in excess of even Busquets, and his 10 assists in LaLiga were the most of any midfielder bar Atletico Madrid's Koke last season.
He joined Real in 2014 after back-to-back Bundesliga titles with Bayern and a World Cup win with Germany in Brazil, and has gone from strength to strength since, making it into the Champions League team of the season for each of the last three campaigns.
Barcelona's Ivan Rakitic might score more from central midfield, but with the embarrassment of attacking riches you are about to click through, Kroos' ability to pick the right pass sees him get the nod.
Forward I: Lionel Messi
9 of 11
Probably the easiest pick on the list, Lionel Messi is a footballing phenomenon. The Barcelona magician scored 40 goals and assisted 20 in all competitions last term, helping his side to their 24th LaLiga title as well as the Copa del Rey.
His inability to steer Argentina past Chile at the Copa America Centenario may have prompted a brief international retirement with his compatriots longing for the glory years of Diego Maradona, but there can be no questioning the 29-year-old's ability.
It is hard to avoid the feeling you are witnessing a footballing savant on watching Messi's UEFA goal of the season as Barca beat Bayern in the 2014/15 Champions League. He simply seems to see situations before they happen, and his ability to execute the best possible route to goal is terrifying for defenders.
"Messi is an alien that dedicates himself to playing with humans," Juventus goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon told the Guardian last June. With Messi being the only player to have won five FIFA Ballons d'Or, it is difficult to disagree, and impossible to leave him out of this team.
Forward II: Luis Suarez
10 of 11
The focal point of the attack, Luis Suarez is run close by Bayern Munich's prolific Poland captain Robert Lewandowski when it comes to taking up the No. 9 position.
Lewandowski has already scored 10 goals in six games for club and country this season—one more than Suarez in the same time—but last season Suarez scored 40 league goals to Lewandowski's 30, chipping in with 16 assists to the Pole's two.
Winner of the European Golden Shoe for the second time in 2015-16, Suarez's finishing, mobility and link-up play with Messi and Neymar for Barcelona and Edinson Cavani for Uruguay mean he is rightly one of—if not the—most feared strikers on the planet.
Forward III: Cristiano Ronaldo
11 of 11
Messi, Suarez and Neymar combined for an unprecedented 90 goals and 44 assists in LaLiga last season, but if anyone can break up the much vaunted 'MSN' combination, then it is Portuguese powerhouse Cristiano Ronaldo.
The Real Madrid star assisted one fewer goal than Neymar's 12, but he comfortably outscored the Brazilian and Messi in LaLiga, netting 35 times.
Like Ramos, Ronaldo proved his knack for stepping up for the biggest occasions last season. He scored the winning penalty in the Champions League final shoot-out victory over Atleti after plundering a record tournament-high 17 goals in 11 games.
The former Manchester United winger was then pivotal for Portugal at UEFA EURO 2016, scoring three times to help his nation to the final, in which they beat host nation France 1-0 after extra-time.
Ronaldo came off after 25 minutes with a knee injury, but he will nonetheless go down in history as the Portugal captain who guided the Iberian nation to their first major international honour.
.jpg?w=600 "Manning Asked Mendoza to Attend Draft")
.png?w=600 "Top 300 Prospects 📊")
.jpg?w=600 "Vrabel to Get Counseling, Miss Draft")