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There is no doubt that football is one of the best sports in the world, with almost every country playing it on a professional level. Football has the ability to bring together people of different backgrounds and religions. It is a game filled with emotions, feelings and celebrations!
It is known as a beautiful game and is one of the most watched games on the planet. With millions of fans all around the world, and people supporting different clubs, football has emerged as one of the best sports to play and watch. With viewers and players ranging from kids to adults, football truly encapsulates the essence of humanity and sportsmanship.
Many footballers have attained legendary status due to their mad skills and mental ability to play football. Football has helped in bringing together many people and even nations together.
With the recent 2018 FIFA World Cup taking place in Russia, most of the focus has shifted on the national football teams, as they are competing against each other, in order to win the prestigious World Cup trophy and claim the title of World Champions. But let us focus on football clubs for a bit.
There are some excellent football clubs, like Manchester United FC, some underdogs like Leicester City FC, some great football clubs like Bayern Munich. And then there are the legendary football clubs, like Real Madrid CF and FC Barcelona. All these football clubs are different in many aspects, but there is one thing which all the clubs have in common: their passion for football.
FC Barcelona is a Spanish football club which has achieved a lot over its history. Having won almost all of the major European trophies, FC Barcelona has cemented itself as one of the best football clubs in the world. But what makes FC Barcelona such a brilliant football club? Is it fans? Is it the stadium? The answer is the players! FC Barcelona is known for its world-class footballers, who have enshrined themselves in the history books of football.
Here are the ten greatest Barcelona players of all time:
Honourable Mentions:
Although these 10 players have contributed significantly to FC Barcelona’s success, many other players have also contributed to the success, such as Pique, Neymar, Luis Suarez, Samuel Eto’o, Dani Alves, etc.
FC Barcelona also has a fantastic youth development academy, focusing on developing young and upcoming players, who will contribute to the future success of FC Barcelona. Remember, many players mentioned in this list were FC Barcelona youth academy products, very soon we will see a diverse and fun playing FC Barcelona!
#10 Luis Enrique
Luis Enrique was another manager who is known for his managerial skills and abilities, but he was known as one of the most versatile players FC Barcelona ever had. He was known for his temper and stamina and skills. He was controversially known for his switch to the rivals of FC Barcelona, Real Madrid CF. His footballing prowess was well known, along with his passing abilities and his natural gift of scoring and creating goals.
#9 Antoni Ramallets
Having won the prestigious Zamora Trophy 5 times, Antoni Ramallets was an excellent goalkeeper who played for Barcelona. He was known for his agility and football intelligence and knew how to position himself in the field so as to stop players from scoring.
Ramallets was well known for his ability to stop goals at an instance and make clearance across the football fields in a jiff. A versatile goalkeeper, Ramallets led FC Barcelona to great heights and glory and gave a new importance to the word of a goalkeeper.
#8 Pep Guardiola
Pep Guardiola is known in modern times for his managerial skills, but only a few people know that he used to play for FC Barcelona! He was a creative and gifted player, and was part of the “Dream Team”, which won the clubs first ever European title!
He also captained the team for a few years, before moving to other clubs. But he later on returned as a manager for the club and won 14 titles in the span of 4 years! He was known for his creative footballing style and his dribbling abilities too.
He followed a footballing philosophy of tiki-taka and implemented it t some extent in his footballing career. It was when he was a manager that he implemented it on a larger and grander scale.
#7 Rivaldo
An attacking midfielder, Rivaldo formed a brilliant partnership with another Barcelona player, Patrick Kluivert, during his time in FC Barcelona and won the 1998 and 1999 La Liga cup. He was one of the most creative footballers of his generation and was well known for his mind-blowing free kicks and the ability to score and create insane and beautiful goals.
He was also known for his bending free kicks, bicycle kicks and striking the ball with power from a distance. He was also known for his use of feints, and his balance. He was a dead ball specialist and was also known for his penalty taking abilities.
#6 Johan Cruyff
The Netherlands footballer was known for promoting ‘total football’. He was known for his technical footballing abilities and speed and dribbling. His mentality about football and playing football is well known and was one of the reasons for FC Barcelona’s success in the 1970s.
Cruyff was also known for his goal scoring abilities, helping his team win matches as well as trophies. He invented the Cruyff Turn, a footballing move which has been replicated by a number of footballers in recent times. According to Xavi, Cruyff created FC Barcelona’s philosophy of football!
#5 Carlos Puyol
Puyol gave his heart and life for FC Barcelona, and Barcelona regarded him in plentiful. He served as a long-term captain for the team and won 20 titles with Barcelona, including three Champions League titles.
A defender with experience in the footballing world for more than 15 years, Puyol has made FC Barcelona the strong football giant it is today! He was well known for his beautiful tackles and for stopping players from scoring goals.
As a captain, he was known for his leadership skills and his ability to make the team work together. It’s due to this that FC Barcelona won a lot of matches.
#4 Ronaldinho
Known for his creativity and insane footballing skills, Ronaldinho shone into fame during his 5-year tenure in FC Barcelona. He won his first FIFA World Player of the Year with FC Barcelona! He has been praised for his technical skills and dribbling and ball-control abilities.
He wore the famous number 10 shirt for FC Barcelona. Ronaldinho was well known for his insane and creative footballing tricks, which he frequently used in football games. He has scored 70 goals for FC Barcelona, in 145 matches.
That’s almost a goal in every 2 matches! His footballing abilities were so well respected that Real Madrid fans used to give him standing ovations!
#3 Andres Iniesta
A mesmerizing midfielder, Iniesta is known as the Spanish footballing wizard. Having created an inseparable partnership with his long-term friend and teammate, Xavi Hernandez, Iniesta played an important role in Barcelona’s title loaded 2008-2009 football campaign, where they won 6 titles.
A footballer who created assists and helped his teammates score goals, Andres Iniesta will be remembered by club fans for years to come. His dribbling abilities, as well as composure, was well known across the footballing world.
He was also an amazing goal creator, helping create goals and in assists for his teammates. He was an all-rounder because he scored brilliant goals as well as helped in creating them.
Also read: Infinite Iniesta: 675 games, 57 goals, 142 assists, 32 major trophies
#2 Xavi
Xavi Hernandez, fondly known as Xavi, was one of the greatest midfielders FC Barcelona had ever witnessed and had. He was the one who infused and executed the tiki-taka football style into FC Barcelona.
With the ability to outsmart other players on the field, Xavi had made a name for himself in the football world, as well as in FC Barcelona. His dribbling and passing abilities are well known, and he was one of the first few footballers to implement the tiki-taka style of football.
He was also known for his long passes, which helped players score some breathtaking and brilliant goals.
#1 Lionel Messi
Probably the greatest football player of all time, Lionel Messi has cemented himself as one of the greatest football players in the world. It can be said that FC Barcelona is the great, legendary club it is today, partly because of Messi.
Being the highest goal scorer for FC Barcelona, Messi will go down in football history as a legendary player, with amazing dribbling and goal scoring skills. He is a left-footed player and makes use of his agility and ability to control the ball with ease and efficiency. Messi is also known for his innovative and creative ways of scoring goals, as well as making and assisting goals.
