Top 10 Champions League Wingers

jonjoward1998
14 hours ago
7 min read

I would normally do a European League's top 10 later in the week but with this week being a Champions League week, I've decided to do it earlier in the week and do a Champions League related top 10.

This week's European League's top 10 is Champions League Wingers.

Many of the best wingers in Europe have lit up the Champions League over the years and it was in this very competition where we first saw the role of a winger change.

Wingers used to be players who would hog the touchline and get crosses into the box and now they're known as inside forwards because they're being asked to cut inside and score goals.

I think it was the Spanish teams who set the tone for wingers cutting inside with Barcelona and Real Madrid in particular having those kind of players in Ronaldinho and Luis Figo respectively. And now every team across Europe has those kind of players.

Ronaldinho and Figo are somehow not on the list and when I look back at the list, I really should've included them because they're two of the finest wingers to play the game and they both won the competition.

Now here is the list:

Franck Ribery

Lionel Messi

Ryan Giggs

Arjen Robben

Mohamed Salah

Cristiano Ronaldo

Gareth Bale

David Beckham

Neymar

Vinicius Junior

David Beckham

Beckham won the Champions League with Man United in 1999 in the season they won the treble and he had a role to play in the winning goal as it was his corner that was flicked on by Teddy Sheringham into the path of Ole Gunnar Solskjaer who scored the winning goal.

He was without a doubt the finest set piece taker and crosser that England have ever had and he showed it many times throughout United's treble winning season in 1999.

He probably should've won it again when he was at Real Madrid as one of the Galacticos alongside the likes of Zidane, Raul, Ronaldo and Roberto Carlos. But despite the calibre of players that team had, they somehow got nowhere near winning it.

I had to have him down in tenth because he was a different winger from the others in the list in that he was just a good crosser of the ball and didn't get the goals the other players got.

Franck Ribery

Ribery was part of the Bayern Munich team that won the treble in 2013 and he set up the winning goal for Arjen Robben in the final against Borussia Dortmund.

He was an integral part of that side and a lot of people felt that he should've won the Ballon D'or that year because how influential he was during that season and especially in the Champions League.

Those people definitely have a point because he probably deserved it because of the year he had with Bayern and him having arguably a more successful year than Ronaldo and Messi, who finished above him in the standings.

He was one of the best wingers in Europe on his day because of his pace, agility and ability to cut inside and score goals as well as create goals as well.

Arjen Robben

Robben was also part of the Bayern Munich team that won the treble in 2013 and it was his winning goal in the final against Borussia Dortmund that won Bayern the Champions League.

Scoring the winning goal in that final was a moment of redemption for him after he missed a penalty in the final the season before against Chelsea which had a big effect on him.

For him to bounce back and score the winning goal a year later shows the kind of character he was and his determination to put things right.

He was a handful for any defender on his day because of his pace, agility, skills and ability to cut inside and score goals.

Neymar

Neymar won the Champions League with Barcelona in 2015 and he also scored the winning goal in the final against Juventus which won the cup for Barca.

That season was Barca's first with the MSN frontline which tore up every defence in Europe that season and although Messi was the main star of that trio, Neymar still played a key role by scoring lots of important goals throughout that season.

Bara was where he had the best years of his career because of the success he had there and the form he showed during his time there as well.

He went to PSG so he could step out of Messi's shadow and become the man as well as to move the club closer towards winning the Champions League.

But it wasn't to be as he was usually injured around the last 16 stage which was where PSG crashed out at for most of his time at the club.

He would probably be higher if this was about ability but as it's about the Champions League, I had to put him down in seventh because he won it once.

Vinicius Junior

Vinicius has won the Champions League twice at Real Madrid in 2022 and 2024 respectively and he also scored the winning goals in both finals.

The first season he won it saw him develop into one of the best players in the world as he added more goals to his game and he was firmly established as one of the best by the time he won it the second time.

There is a case for him to be higher because he won it twice but as he's still playing and has the rest of his career ahead of him, I had to have him in the bottom half.

He'll probably be higher up this list in a few years time as he's likely to win it a few more times because of Real's record in the competition and how important a player he is for them.

Ryan Giggs

Giggs won the Champions League twice at Man United in 1999 and 2008 respectively and he played a key role in both sides.

He set up Teddy Sheringham's goal in the1999 final against Bayern Munich which started United's late comeback in stoppage time despite his delivery into the box not being his best.

He scored the final penalty kick in the shootout in the 2008 final against Chelsea which set United on their way to winning the trophy before Van Der Sar's save from Nicolas Anelka's penalty sealed it.

He was in the latter stages of his career that year, but he still played a key role for United during that season by putting in a shift for his team which he did throughout his time at United.

Mohamed Salah

Salah has won the Champions League just the once with Liverpool in 2019. But I had to have him in my top 5 because of his incredible goal record in the competition.

He's scored 53 goals in the Champions League with 47 of them coming at Liverpool and his performances in this competition have put him among Europe's elite as well as the goals he's scored.

He scored the opening goal in the 2019 final against Spurs from the penalty spot which set the reds on their way to winning their sixth European Cup.

Him scoring int hat moment was a big moment for him after what happened the year before when he went off with that shoulder injury following that incident with Sergio Ramos.

Gareth Bale

Bale won the Champions League 5 times at Real Madrid in 2014, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2022 but only played a key role in the first four of them as he hardly played during their 2022 success.

He scored in the 2014 and 2018 finals with the latter being the final where he scored that incredible bicycle kick against Liverpool just moments after coming off the bench.

The Champions League was the competition where he first announced himself on the European stage when he scored that hat trick at the San Siro against Inter Milan whilst playing for Spurs.

He would later tear them up yet again in the return leg at White Hart Lane where he made arguably the best right back in the world at the time in Maicon look average.

He returned to the Champions League after a three season absence when he made his big move to Real Madrid and went on to have a successful time there.

Lionel Messi

Messi won the Champions League 4 times when he was at Barcelona in 2006, 2009, 2011 and 2015 respectively and is currently second on the all-time goal charts with 129 goals.

He's come up with many incredible moments in this competition over the years and there have been so many that there is an endless list of them.

The goals he's scored are among them because a lot of them have been of the highest order and are among the greatest goals to have been score in the Champions League.

He's done things on the pitch that very few players have been able to do and I don't think we're going to see another player like him.

Cristiano Ronaldo

The top two was always going to be between Ronaldo and Messi and Ronaldo is the player who wins it because he's the record goal scorer with 140 goals and he's won it the most.

He's won the Champions League 5 times winning it with Man United in 2008 and in 2014, 2016, 2017 and 2018 with Real Madrid.

He might not have been seen as a winger during his final few seasons in Europe, but it was the position he started out in and where he played for the majority of his career.

He was all about the flicks and tricks during his early years before adding end product to his game in terms of goals and once he did, he hit some ridiculous numbers.

MY TOP 10: