Batistuta, The best in the whole world

Date: January 13th, 2000
By: Marco Principini
Source: Il Giorno
Translated by: Mari

We don't have to look at statistics to know of Gabriel Batistuta's prolific goal scoring feats. Breaking records, establishing new ones seems to be Batistuta's specialty. At the end of our research we found out that Batistuta in the 90's, among the players still in activity in the European Championships, he has emerged as the one who has scored the most number of goals.

Following Batistuta is Luc Nilis from Belgium. Nilis a renouned goal scorer now playing in Holland. He's one goal behind Batistuta in the championship but he has only scored twenty two goals for his National team against the fifty goals scored by Bati for Argentina's National Team. To this we have to add the 17 goals scored by Batistuta in International Tournaments such as: "Copa Libertadores (6), Champions League (4), "Coppa dell Coppe" (4), Coppa UEFA (1), and "Torneo Anglo-Italiano" (2).

In third place is German goal scorer Ulf Kirsten, Bayern Levrejusen striker, with 31 goals in the championship, four more than Oliver Bierhoff. In the list of the best of the best, in the first 20 places, we found eight players which play in the Italian Championship. Besides Batistuta there are Roberto Baggio, Zamorano, Bierhoff, Balbo, Signori, Ronaldo and Mijatovic. Eventhough the magnificent scoring feats of the champions the record of the century is in the hand of Brazilian Arthur Friedenreich. Who played in the years l910-l936. We have to keep in mind that the soccer played today is quite different to the one played years back, today is faster, defenders are stronger more movable to name a few.

Arthur Friedenreich was the son of a German and a Brazilian lady. His career was one of the longest in soccer history. He played for twenty six years and scored 1,329 goals. Following Friedenreich is Pele with a quota of 1,280 goals in l,362 matches. Friedenreich played 22 matches with the National Team and won the Paulista Championship seven times.

Another "fuoriclasse" is Alfredo Di Stefano, one of the first to play different positions in the pitch. He played as a midfielder, assist-man, and striker. Di Stefano played in three National Teams, Argentina's (7 goals), Colombia and Spain (23 goals). He played in Argentina with River Plate were he won the championship. Then he played with "Millonarios" in Colombia were he scored 259 goals in 292 matches. After this he went to Europe were he played in Spain with Real Madrid were he scored 405 goals plus l9 with Espanyol. It is in Espanyol were he finished his career.

Another great is Eusebio, he played with Benfica in the Portughese Championship, there he scored more goals than the number of matches played. He scored 316 goals in 294 matches. With the National Team he scored 41 goals in 81 matches.

The next in line is Gerd Muller he has scored 365 goals in 427 matches. He scored 69 goals in 62 matches with Germany's National Team.