Yeah, not bad…

From now until the end of time, people will debate the greatest ever World Cup players, and attempt to come up with the perfect team. Fights will break out, relationships will hit the rocks, old women will be arrested in supermarkets for eye gouging.

It’s not easy to do.

The Spoiler thought long and hard about this, with the likes of Romario, Gullit, Ronaldo, Zico, the Charlton sisters, Baresi, Platini, Hagi, Roberto Carlos, Eusebio, and a big favourite in the office, Michael Laudrup, all very nearly barging their way in. At one point there was even talk of leaving Pele out. Seriously, it was THAT bonkers. But in the end the above eleven made it past the cut.

It’s an attacking team alright.

Thoughts?

Heading off to Man United?

In a move now commonly known as “The Reverse Carlos Tevez”, it looks like Micah Richards might yet navigate himself across the Manchester divide during the January transfer window. With that in mind, here’s a team of maniacs who risked everything to play for a rival club… 

Goalkeeper, Pat Jennings - Spurs (1964-1977), Arsenal (1977-1985)

After thirteen very impressive years at White Hart Lane, the consensus was that Pat Jennings was just about ready to hang up his gloves. Instead, he threw caution to the wind, and waltzed over to Arsenal to carry on for another eight years. He then returned to Spurs to play in the reserve team. A hunch suggests that a similar gesture perhaps wouldn’t be afforded to Sol Campbell.

Right Back, Nelson Vivas - Boca Juniors (1994-1997), River Plate (2003)

Most of you probably remember Nelson Vivas as the plucky understudy to Lee Dixon and Nigel Winterburn at Arsenal. And you’d be right! But he was also the daring Argentine defender who has played for both of the featured teams in the fiercely fought Superclasico, which finds the angry poor people of Boca Juniors throwing their mucky kitchen sinks at the hoity toity poshos from River Plate.

Under 21 side make a pig’s ear of scoring opportunity

Scientists who obviously had no diseases to cure recently discovered the technique for a perfect penalty: the taker should approach at an angle 20 to 30 degrees, hit the ball at 65mph, and aim exactly half a metre inside the crossbar and either goalpost.

Clearly, this stunning scientific development has yet to reach Portgual, as demonstrated in the national team’s U21 performance against the mighty Cape Verde yesterday.

Sporting’s midfielder Bruno Pereirinha attempted to recreate Johan Cruyff’s legendary passed penalty, by knocking the ball to Porto’s Rui Pedro. The plan was thwarted when a defender intercepted, and the pair were left looking as stupid as Thierry Henry and Robert Pires did in 2005.

Fortunately, the crappy spot kick had no effect on the result, as Portugal were 2-0 victors.

[Off The Post]

Dutch ace adds strange tale to an already murky history

Until now, it had widely been assumed that Johan Cruyff, in spite of being the most exciting player in the world at the time, missed the 1978 World Cup in Argentina as a protest against that country’s odious torture-happy dictatorship. Speaking on Catalan radio this morning, however, he revealed that a strange incident in 1978 helped make his mind up.

He said that a number of men broke into his home in Barcelona, where he was playing at the time, threatened him and his wife with shotguns in front of their children and tied them to chairs. His wife, however, managed to escape, as did Cruyff before the clearly incompetent kidnappers