WHO'S TOP GOAL SCORER?

As Ronaldo popped in two more goals in Real Madrid's, European Champions League tie last night and Lionel Messi didn't, I got to thinking about the greatest goalscorers of all time. Ten quickly came to mind with the help of the www. OK it was a quiet afternoon and I didn't want too much sun.

Top man might be Gerd Muller, Der Bomber, of Bayern Munich, who scored 35 European goals in 35 matches. That's a ratio of 1:1.

Ference Puskas of Budapest Honved and later Real Madrid, known as the Galloping Major, made a fool of England and also club opposition in his career, scoring 36 in 41 games (0.88).

Close behind comes Jose Joao Altafini, a Brazilian, who with AC Milan and Juve scored 24/28 at 0.86.

These are familiar names, so are Alfredo di Stefano, with Real notched 49/58 at 0.84 and Messi, who at the moment trails at 0.78 75/96.

Ruud van Nistelroy who featured with PSV, Man U and Real, comes in at 0.77 (56/73), not bad for somebody who was signed by Sir Alex with an injury for £16m and came good!

Jean Pierre Papin, of Marseille and AC and BM, is seventh with 0.76 (28/37) with the Black Pearl, Eusebio of Benfica, top scorer in European Cups in 1965, 66 and 68 with 46/65, is 8^th.

Christiano Ronaldo (MU and RM) scored 76 in 116 at 0.66 with Romario, a Brazilian, of Barca and PSV also ratioed 0.66 with 20/32.

All these are great names and each one succeeding in differing periods of European competition.

Was it harder to score in the 1950-60s with heavy leather footballs and dodgey pitches or now with team strategy and technique finely tuned?

Top international goalscorers put Puskas in second place behind Ali Daei of Iran who scored 109 goals in 149 matches between 1993-2006; against whom?

Puskas comes second, Pele 5^th, Muller 12^th and Robbie Keane 14^th with 67 in 142 games.

Romario is 27^th , Christian Ronaldo 27^th and Wayne Rooney 43^rd with his 50^th goal scored recently.

Highest scoring player must be Arthur Friedenreich of Brazil (1909-1935) who scored an "undocumented" number of 1329 goals in his career. See photo.

Pele rates high (with his Milesimo, 1000^{th  i}n 1969) playing in his 909^th first class match, totalled eventually, 1363 appearances and 1279 goals! Some of his "career" goals may not pass the "official game" test-14 of his total apparently came in "military" matches.

Franz Binder of Austria and Germany (1930-49) in 756 matches produced 1006 goals.

Muller, Eusebio, Puskas, Romario and di Stefano all come in the top 9 in history, which confirms their success in European Cup matches.