EURO top scorers and appearance records
Monday, January 28, 2019
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Who are the most impressive performers in the history of the UEFA European Championship?
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Cristiano Ronaldo is setting the pace in terms of all-time EURO finals appearances and goals, though he has yet to finish top scorer at a final tournament.
UEFA.com reels off the key figures.
Final tournament goals
9: Michel Platini (France)
9: Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal)
7: Alan Shearer (England)
6: Zlatan Ibrahimović (Sweden)
6: Thierry Henry (France)
6: Patrick Kluivert (Netherlands)
6: Nuno Gomes (Portugal)
6: Antoine Griezmann (France)
6: Wayne Rooney (England)
6: Ruud van Nistelrooy (Netherlands)
Final tournament appearances
21: Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal)
18: Bastian Schweinsteiger (Germany)
17: Gianluigi Buffon (Italy)
16: Cesc Fàbregas (Spain)
16: Andrés Iniesta (Spain)
16: Lilian Thuram (France)
16: Edwin van der Sar (Netherlands)
15: João Moutinho (Portugal)
15: Nani (Portugal)
15: Pepe (Portugal)
15: Sergio Ramos (Spain)
15: David Silva (Spain)
• Cristiano Ronaldo has amassed his nine goals and his appearances record by featuring at four different EUROs, though he has never scored more than three (his tally for 2012 and 2016) at a single final tournament. He was joint top scorer at UEFA EURO 2012 but has never won the prize outright.
• Ronaldo's goals at UEFA EURO 2016 made him the first player to have scored at four EUROs. To date, no player has appeared in five editions of the competition; Iker Casillas was in the Spain squad for the last five EUROs, but was an unused squad member in the 2000 and 2016 editions.
• The maximum number of games that a player can feature in at UEFA EURO 2020 is seven. Hence, only players on the current leaderboard will have any chance of surpassing him at the finals (and since many have already retired, his position looks to be secure until UEFA EURO 2024 at least).
Tournament top scorers
1960: 2 François Heutte (France), Viktor Ponedelnik (USSR), Valentin Ivanov (USSR), Dražan Jerković (Yugoslavia), Milan Galić (Yugoslavia)
1964: 2 Jesús Pereda (Spain), Ferenc Bene (Hungary), Dezső Novák (Hungary)
1968: 2 Dragan Džajić (Yugoslavia)
1972: 4 Gerd Müller (West Germany)
1976: 4 Dieter Müller (West Germany)
1980: 3 Klaus Allofs (West Germany)
1984: 9 Michel Platini (France)
1988: 5 Marco van Basten (Netherlands)
1992: 3 Henrik Larsen (Denmark), Karl-Heinz Riedle (Germany), Dennis Bergkamp (Netherlands), Tomas Brolin (Sweden)
1996: 5 Alan Shearer (England)
2000: 5 Patrick Kluivert (Netherlands), Savo Milošević (Yugoslavia)
2004: 5 Milan Baroš (Czech Republic)
2008: 4 David Villa (Spain)
2012: 3 Fernando Torres (Spain), Alan Dzagoev (Russia), Mario Mandžukić (Croatia), Mario Gomez (Germany), Mario Balotelli (Italy), Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal)
2016: 6 Antoine Griezmann (France)
• In his only EURO as a player, Michel Platini scored nine in the 1984 finals, including hat-tricks in successive group fixtures. The nearest anyone has come to matching that one-campaign tally was when Antoine Griezmann scored six at UEFA EURO 2016.
• A top scorer is no guarantee of title success. Nine of the 15 winning teams have had players who were top scorer (or joint top scorer). The most dangerous marksmen of 1968, 1976 and 2016 were all losing finalists, while the 1996, 2000 and 2004 top scorers never made it to the final.
Highest scoring teams, tournament by tournament
1960: Yugoslavia 6
1964: Spain, Russia, Hungary 4
1968: Italy 3
1972: West Germany 5
1976: West Germany 6
1980: West Germany 6
1984: France 14
1988: Netherlands 8
1992: Germany 7
1996: Germany 10
2000: France, Netherlands 13
2004: England, Czech Republic 10
2008: Spain 12
2012: Spain 12
2016: France 13
• Only once in the competition's history has the top-scoring side failed to at least reach the final: in 2004, when quarter-finalists England and semi-finalists Czech Republic (ten each) both eclipsed winners Greece's tally of seven.