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All-Time Top 50: Number 17 - Eusebio

Last updated : 09 February 2006 By Simon Head

Eusebio: Portugal's greatest ever player
Eusebio’s two greatest assets were his pace and his ferocious shooting. He could have been an international athlete for Portugal, as he was the Portuguese under 19 champion at 100m, 200m and 400m as a youngster. But thankfully he chose football – and his superb dribbling skills and spectacular goals lit up the game throughout the 60s and 70s.


He joined the famous Benfica club as a 19 year old in 1961 and one year later he took on Real Madrid and the likes of the great Ferenc Puskas and Alfredo Di Stefano, in the European Cup final. Rather than wilting in the presence of such greatness, he bettered them, scoring twice as Benfica beat Real 5-3.


Eusebio led Benfica to 10 league championships and 5 Portuguese Cups, and finished as the Portuguese League’s top scorer every year from 1964 to 1973. He also won the European Footballer of the Year in 1965 and won the Golden Boot for European Football’s leading goalscorer in both 1968 and 1973.


For any striker to average a goal every two games for his club is an amazing feat, but Eusebio’s striking prowess at Benfica was nothing short of sensational. In 715 games, he scored 727 goals.


He wasn’t bad at international level, either. He was the tournament’s top goalscorer in the 1966 World Cup in England, scoring nine goals, including four goals in one game, when he single-handedly saved Portugal from an embarrassing defeat against a Pak Do Ik inspired North Korea at Goodison Park.


He scored 41 international goals for Portugal in just 64 matches – and has only recently seen his international record surpassed, by current Portugal striker Pauleta. But there’s no comparing the two players in terms of ability and standing within the game.


Eusebio will rightly be remembered as one of the greatest players of all time – and his goals will live long in the memory for those who saw him in action.