If you're sitting down with friends at a pub quiz and are asked the identity of the 'most decorated club player ever', you'd be forgiven for guessing with authority.
It has to be Ryan Giggs, hasn't it? While an admirable guess, you're wrong.
One of the most popular threads on reddit soccer this morning regards the usurping of Giggs' crown by noted friend of Zlatan Ibrahimovic: Maxwell.
PSG won the French Super Cup last night, bringing Maxwell's personal major trophy haul to 35. Giggs collected 34 (this excludes his recent triumph in the Indian Futsal Super League).
Now this is a decent stat: a solid if unspectacular player is Maxwell, a player who, in a parallel universe, is famous for his TV series Maxwell's Houses, in which he goes to inspect the opulent houses of fellow professional footballers.
Here s the top 10 as listed by the reddit user who posted the thread, along with a list of possible usurpers:
Top 10
Maxwell-35 Giggs-34 Baia-31 Dalglish-31 Alves-31 Ibrahimovich-30 Pele-28 Iniesta-28 Messi-28 Maldini-26 Xavi-25 Scholes-25 Van Der Sar-25 Beckham-25
Future contenders
Robben-24 Busquets-23 Pique-23 Scheweinsteiger-23 Thiago-22 Carvalho-22 Lahm-21 Evra-21 Pedro-20 Sneijder-19 Buffon-18 Casillas-18 C. Ronaldo-17 Kroos-15 Neymar-14 Müller-14 Alaba-14
But as it turns out, the post was wrong, as one commenter/pedant points out below the line.
It turns out that the trophy cabinet under the most strain belongs to retired Egyptian footballer Hossam Hassan. He is Egypt's all-time leading scorer, and he played against Ireland at the 1990 World Cup.
His club career has been astonishingly successful, winning a total of 36 trophies. Here's the Wiki list:
Remarkable.
Maxwell's achievements are objectively more impressive than Hassan's, despite being slightly fewer.
That said, given PSG's strength, it will be Maxwell's crown soon enough.
[r/soccer]
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