Who has a full set of club and national trophies?
Tuesday, April 26, 2016
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Jesús Navas could join an exclusive club if he wins the UEFA Champions League with Manchester City, as UEFA.com meets the players who won it all.
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Jesús Navas can become one of a select band of players to have won all the major club and international trophies of their day as Manchester City take on Real Madrid for a place in the UEFA Champions League final.
Twice a UEFA Cup winner with Sevilla, the 30-year-old winger was a FIFA World Cup champion with Spain and also featured at UEFA EURO 2012 (although not in Spain's final victory); which leaves only the UEFA Champions League for him to complete the set of main club and national-team winner's medals. Two of his Spain colleagues – Juan Mata and Fernando Torres – joined what previously had been an all-German band when they lifted the UEFA Cup with Chelsea in 2013.
Up until then, just five players could lay claim to having won it all – with Franz Beckenbauer perhaps having the strongest of those claims. The archetypal sweeper started his collection by landing the European Cup Winners' Cup – then UEFA's second competition – in 1967 with Bayern; he and team-mates Hans-Georg Schwarzenbeck, Gerd Müller and Sepp Maier all went on to win the 1972 UEFA European Championship and also took the 1974 World Cup in the midst of a run of three straight European Champion Clubs' Cups for Bayern.
So that is four trophies each for all of those players (though Schwarzenbeck was not in the XI that claimed the 1967 Cup Winners' Cup). Beckenbauer, however, went a step further as a coach; in addition to steering Germany to World Cup glory in 1990, he got his hands on a yet-to-be-matched fifth different winner's medal when his Bayern side beat Bordeaux to the 1996 UEFA Cup.
Another star of West Germany's 1972 and 1974 triumphs has a dog in the fight too. Jupp Heynckes did not figure in that '74 final ("I was sidelined by injury – the greatest disappointment of my life"), yet was a squad member and also did something none of his Bayern counterparts could match by picking up the UEFA Cup as a player. That was with Borussia Mönchengladbach in 1975 when he missed the first leg against Twente but made amends with a hat-trick in the return.
He never won the European Cup as a player, but did so twice as a coach – with Real Madrid in 1998 and with Bayern in 2013. Thus the only significant missing piece from his haul is a Cup Winners' Cup medal, yet since that competition was incorporated into the UEFA Cup from 1999/2000 onwards, he could argue that his UEFA Cup one is equivalent.
Navas, meanwhile, may also have some explaining to do if he is to be allowed behind the velvet rope of the 'winning it all' enclosure, even if he does figure in a final conquest for City – since he did not actually play in the UEFA EURO 2012 decider. He has not represented Spain since being omitted from the 2014 World Cup squad, but an appearance in a Spain final victory in France this summer would remove any lingering doubt.
Players who have won all the major tournaments of their day
Franz Beckenbauer
EURO: West Germany 1972
World Cup: West Germany 1974 & 1990*
ECCC/UCL: Bayern 1973/74, 1974/75 & 1975/76
ECWC: Bayern 1966/67
UCUP: Bayern 1995/96*
Jupp Heynckes
EURO: West Germany 1972
World Cup: West Germany 1974**
ECCC/UCL: Real Madrid 1997/98*, Bayern 2012/13*
UCUP/UEL: Mönchengladbach 1974/75
Sepp Maier
EURO: West Germany 1972
World Cup: West Germany 1974
ECCC/UCL: Bayern 1973/74, 1974/56 & 1975/76
ECWC: Bayern 1966/67
Juan Mata
EURO: Spain 2012
World Cup: Spain 2010
ECCC/UCL: Chelsea 2011/12
UCUP/UEL: Chelsea 2012/13
Gerd Müller
EURO: West Germany 1972
World Cup: West Germany 1974
ECCC/UCL: Bayern 1973/74, 1974/56 & 1975/76
ECWC: Bayern 1966/67
Hans-Georg Schwarzenbeck
EURO: West Germany 1972
World Cup: West Germany 1974
ECCC/UCL: Bayern 1973/74, 1974/56 & 1975/76
ECWC: Bayern 1966/67**
Fernando Torres
EURO: Spain 2008, 2012
World Cup: Spain 2010
ECCC/UCL: Chelsea 2011/12
UCUP/UEL: Chelsea 2012/13
* won as a coach
** unused squad member in final