On 19 September, Tuesday, the group stage of Europe's most prestigious club tournament - the Champions League - will start. A few facts from the history of this tournament.
In the 50s of the last century in Europe, the number of international meetings in which the strongest club teams from different countries took part increased significantly. One team or another of them managed to achieve excellent results, one or the other was labelled by the press as the strongest in the Old World.
It became clear that a new tournament was needed. And such a tournament was "born". Its initiator were journalists of the famous French newspaper "Ekip". 16 December 1954 on the front page of the newspaper appeared the headline: "We offer a football European Cup".
The proposal of the active initiator of such a tournament, journalist Gabriel Ano, was approved by UEFA on 2 March 1955. To contest the first European Cup, such was the name of the tournament, clubs from 16 countries expressed their desire.
On 4 September 1955 in Lisbon, local Sporting and Yugoslavian Partizan kicked off first in the draw of the new tournament. A 60 centimetre high silver cup in the form of an amphora and the title of the strongest team in Europe awaited the winner.
The first winner of the Champions Cup was Real Madrid, who defeated French side Reims 4-3 in the decisive match. Having won its first tournament, Real Madrid brought the trophy to Madrid four years in a row (in 1957, 1958, 1959 and 1960).
After 37 editions of the Champions Cup, the tournament was renamed the Champions League in 1993. During the time of the most prestigious club tournament in the Old World, Real Madrid played in 17 finals, and won 14 of them. In 2022 Madrid defeated English Liverpool 1-0 in a hard-fought battle. In general, Spanish clubs are successful in this tournament - for example, five more times the Champions League was won by Catalan Barcelona.
Five multi-winners
23 European clubs have won the trophy. Five of them twice each - Juventus (Italy), Benfica (Portugal), Nottingham Forrest (England), Porto (Portugal), Chelsea (England). Four times the beautiful cup went to Ajax (Netherlands), five times to Barcelona (Spain). In 2023, in the final of the English Manchester City defeated Inter Milan (1:0) and won the honourable trophy for the first time in its history.
And here are the five multi-winning clubs: Real Madrid - 14 trophies (17 finals), AC Milan - 7 (11), Liverpool - 6 (10), Bayern Munich - 6 (11), Barcelona - 5 (8).
There are also losers in this tournament - Juventus suffered seven defeats in nine finals, Benfica lost five times in seven decisive matches, Bayern lost to their opponents five times in ten final games.
Played and scored
The highest number of matches played in this tournament were:
187 - Cristiano Ronaldo (Sporting, Manchester United, Real Madrid, Juventus)
181 - Iker Casillas.
163 - Lionel Messi (Barcelona, PSG)
157 - Javi Hernandez (Barcelona)
152 - Karim Benzema (Lyon, Real Madrid).
And here are the top five scorers:
141 - Cristiano Ronaldo
129 - Lionel Messi
91 - Robert Lewandowski (Borussia D, Bayern Munich, Barcelona).
90 - Karim Benzema
71 - Raul Gonzalez (Real Madrid, Schalke)
The first Dynamo goal in the Champions Cup was scored by Anatoliy Puzach on 20 September 1967 in the match Celtic (Scotland) - Dynamo - 1:2. In general, the Kyivians performed in the Champions Cup/Champions League not as successfully as the team's fans would have liked. Although Dynamo reached the semi-finals of the tournament three times - twice in the Champions Cup (in 1977 and 1987) and once in the Champions League (in 1999).
Twice Dynamo won the Cup Winners' Cup (in 1975 and 1986) and the UEFA Super Cup (in 1975). I would like to see in Kyiv among Dynamo trophies and the main prize of the Champions League. After all, hope always fuels the fans. And dreaming, as you know, is not harmful...
Oleksandr LIPENKO for Dynamo.kiev.ua
