Before the Champions League, ten other players scored five times in a Champions Cup match

Pep Guardiola was the enemy of history: he probably had his reasons, but he took Erling Haaland off the field at a time when he had enormous chances to break the record for goals in a single Champions League match. And not just the Champions League. Europe’s premier club tournament was revamped in 1992, but it has a huge legacy since it began in 1955 as the European Champions Cup. And in that previous phase, ten players managed to reach the same mark.

Almost always in the first rounds, when the imbalance was huge. Powerful teams like Milan, Ferencváros and Anderlecht faced champions from Luxembourg or Iceland and the routs reached even grotesque numbers. The most powerful team that conceded five goals from the same player in that period was probably Malmö, from Sweden, victimized by Bulgarian Nikola Kotkov, from Lokomotiv Sofia.

The list has some lesser-known players and some legendary ones, such as José Altafini, Florián Albert and Gerd Müller – who is always cited in any goalscoring record we can think of.

Owe Ohlsson (Göteborg) no 6 x 1 against o Linfield, preliminary phase 1959/60

The Pioneer. And a world runner-up for the Swedish national team. Owe Ohlsson spent most of his career with Göteborg, with whom he won the national title in 1957/58. When that season ended, you can’t say he traveled, because the Cup was in Sweden, so he stayed to watch his team reach the final against Brazil from the bench – he didn’t play a single game. In the preliminary round of the 1959/60 Champions Cup, Göteborg started losing away from home to Linfield, from Northern Ireland, 2-1. At home, however, Ohlsson scored five times and led the victory by 6-1 which put the Swedes through to the next round. That Göteborg campaign ended in the first round against Sparta Rotterdam.

Bent Løfqvist (Boldklubben 1913) no 9 x 2 contra o Spora, phase preliminary 1961/62

Also in the preliminary round, Spora, from Luxembourg, was the victim of the Danish Boldklubben 1913. Bent Løfqvist had already scored two in the first leg, away from home, won by 6 to 0, and released five in the 9 to 2 of the return, in Odense. The campaign came to a disastrous, and predictable, end in the next round, against Real Madrid of Alfredo Di Stéfano and Ferenc Puskás – 3-0, 9-0. Løfqvist ended up being one of the top scorers in that edition and earned a transfer to Metz , from France. He ended his career with OB, another Danish club from Odense.

José Altafini (Milan), no 8 x 0 against Union Luxembourg, preliminary phase 1962/63

Alfatini contra o Benfica na final de Wembley (Foto: George W. Hales/Fox Photos/Getty Images/one Football)

Poor Luxembourg champions who ran the risk of facing a club the size of Milan right away. Evidently, the Italians went over it, without the slightest pity, starting with an 8-0 at San Siro, when José Altafini, Mazzola, scored his five goals. And on the way back, to leave no doubt, he also scored a hat-trick. That was an important campaign for the Brazilian, who left three in the quarterfinals against Galatasaray and secured the title in the final against Benfica, with two more.

Ray Crawford (Ipswich) no 10 x 0 against o Floriana, preliminary 1962/63

Formed by Portsmouth, Ray Crawford had helped Alf Ramsey’s Ipswich conquer the second division by making a deadly partnership with Ted Phillips. Crawford scored 40 times, Phillips 30. The following year, he shared top-flight goalscoring with West Brom’s Derek Kevan. His 33 goals helped Ipswich win the Premier League. The Champions Cup journey began against Floriana, from Malta. Crawford and Phillips shared the honors in the first leg 4-1. The comeback at Portman Road was 10-0, with five goals from Crawford. Ipswich would lose in the next round, to Milan – who would end the tournament as champions.

Nikola Kotkov (Lokomotiv Sofia) no 8 x 3 against Malmö, preliminary stage 1964/65

The most balanced duel of this sequence – which is not to say much. Malmö even won the return by 2-0, after taking a heavy 8-3 in the first leg of the Bulgarian champion. Nikola Kotkov, scorer of five of those eight goals, spent almost his entire career at Lokomotiv Sofia and was named the best Bulgarian player in the national title year 1963/64. It failed to make more noise in that Champions Cup because Lokomotiv lost to Vassas, from Hungary, in the next phase. At the very least, he kept up that good form long enough to earn a call-up for the 1966 World Cup. He faced the Hungarians in the third round of the group stage.

Albert Flórián (Ferencváros), no 9 x 1 against Keflavík, fase preliminar 1965/66

It was a historic Ferencváros player who won France Football magazine’s Ballon d’Or in 1967, beating the likes of Bobby Charlton, Franz Beckenbauer and Gerd Müller. Florián Albert also helped his club win the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup against Juventus, the first continental title in Eastern Europe. The victim of his brand in the Champions Cup was Keflavík, from Iceland. The level difference was really monumental because Ferencváros passed with 13 to 2 on aggregate. Albert’s five goals came in the return game, in Budapest, won by 9-1.

Paul van Himst (Anderlecht), 10-1 against Haka, first round 1966/67

Paul vam Himst greets Eusébio (Photo: STAFF/AFP via Getty Images/One Football)

A legend of Anderlecht and Belgian football. He amended national league titles in the 1960s and early 1960s, reached the final of the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, being the competition’s top scorer, and helped Belgium to be third in the Eurocup in 1972. Then, as a coach, he would win the UEFA Cup, also with Anderlecht, and was the Belgian captain in the 1994 World Cup. against Haka, from Finland. Anderlecht right away won by 10-1 as a visitor and then just confirmed the vacancy.

Gerd Müller (Bayern Munich), in the 9-0 against Omonia, second round 1972/73

Maybe you’ve heard of this one: one of the greatest strikers of all time. And finally it wasn’t right in the first confrontation. Bayern Munich, about to dominate the competition, dispatched Galatasaray in the first phase and ended up crossing with Omonia of Cyprus in the second. The Cypriots had gone through Waterford United, from Ireland, but could not hold the Bavarian giant: 9-0 in Munich, with five goals from Gerd Müller, forwarded the classification by 13-0 on aggregate. Bayern would be defeated in the quarterfinals by Ajax, who ended their own third championship.

Claudio Sulser (Grasshoppers), in the 8-0 v Valletta, first matchday 1978/79

He had a long career for the Grasshoppers, with multiple Swiss Championship titles between the seventies and eighties. He was twice top scorer in the domestic league and earned 50 caps for the national team. Grasshoppers made noise in that Champions Cup: they eliminated Real Madrid in the Round of 16. Before, they went through Valletta, from Malta, with defeats by 8 to 0 and 5 to 0. Sulser scored five times in the first leg, in Zurich.

Søren Lerby (Ajax), in the 10-0 against Omonia, second round 1979/80

Soren Lerby, pela Dinamarca

The most curious name on the list. Søren Lerby was a great player, but known more for his physical prowess and the way he intimidated opponents (and for playing with socks down and without shin guards) than for being a goalscorer. One of Dinamachine’s cogs in the 1980s, he arrived at Ajax as a teenager and, in 1983, was chosen to replace Paul Breitner at Bayern Munich. He was top scorer in the Champions Cup that season, with ten goals, five of them against Omonia, in the Round of 16. Ajax passed Strasbourg and stopped only at Nottingham Forest in the semi-final. It was Lerby’s winning goal by 1-0 against the English in the return game, in Amsterdam, insufficient to take the Dutch club to the decision against Hamburg.

Bonus track

Already in the Champions League phase, there are two other players who managed to score five times in a single match, but in the preliminary phases, before the groups. The Lithuanian Mihails Miholaps was one of them, in July 1999, in Skonto’s 8-0 over Jeunesse Esch, from Luxembourg. More recently, David Lafata, who capped 41 times for the Czech Republic, hit the milestone in a 7-0 defeat of Estonia’s Levadia Tallinn in 2014.