Nobody would say it but the club that contributes the most players to the Euro Cup is the Inter Milan. Thirteen members of the Lombard ranks participate in the tournament, distributed in seven different selections.
One step behind are the other multinationals that are today’s clubs in the free football market. Real Madrid has 12 representatives, just like Paris Saint Germain and Manchester City. Barça also had them until this Monday when Frenkie de Jong was excluded from the list due to the ankle injury that has kept him out since he fell in the Bernabéu classic in a clash with Fede Valverde.
Frenkie de Jong / FC Barcelona
PSG and Manchester City equal Madrid with their 12 representatives in the Euro Cup.
All things considered, Inter’s representative leadership, which has swept the league, should not be a surprise. Was Serie A champion in April, five days from the end. He was also champion of the Italian Super Cup. Only five of its members will face Spain on the 20th in Gelsenkirchen: three defenders (Alessandro Bastoni, Matteo Darmian and Federico Dimarco) and two midfielders (Nicolo Barella and Davide Frattesi).
Barella celebrates Italy’s passage to the European Championship in Germany. / EFE
Spread across 7 countries
No forward. The team’s top scorer was the Argentine Lautaro Martínez (24 goals in the league), who will play in the Copa América, and the second scorer was the Turkish Hakan Calhanoglu. The other Inter players are distributed in France (Benjamin Pavard and Marcus Thuram), two more in the Netherlands (Stefan de Vrij and Denzel Dumfries), one with Switzerland (Yann Sommer), another with Austria (Marko Arnautovic) and one in Albania (Kristjan Asllani), the first rival in the tournament.
The 12 internationals that Real Madrid has loaned are also spread across 7 countries. With anecdotal details regarding Barça. There are more azulgranas than whites with Spain (Pedri, Fermín López, Ferran Torres and Lamine Yamal compared to Dani Carvajal, Nacho, Joselu) and there are as many Real Madrid internationals in Spain as in France: Edward Camavinga, Aurelien Tchouameni and Ferland Mendy. Jules Koundé is the Barcelona replica. Two couples live together in Germany (Marc-Andre ter Stegen and Ilkay Gundogan with Antonio Rudiger and Toni Kroos).
Antonio Rüdiger and Toni Kroos celebrate Madrid’s 15th European Cup. / Rodrigo Jiménez / Efe
The others walk alone. The blaugranas Andreas Christensen (Denmark), Robert Lewandowski (Poland) and João Cancelo and João Felix (Portugal) on the one hand and the whites Luka Modric (Croatia), Jude Bellingham (England), Andriy Lunin (Ukraine) and Arda Güler), for another. So much dissemination will cause them to see each other’s faces during the tournament.
Two Barça records
Despite the unexpected loss of De Jong, the 11 Barça players beat the historical record of attendance in a Euro Cup that dated back to 2000, when He contributed 10 to the tournament, among them six to Holland (Michael Reiziger, Frank and Ronald de Boer, Phillip Cocu, Patrick Kluivert and Boudewijn Zenden), three to Spain (Abelardo, Sergi Barjuan and Pep Guardiola), and Luis Figo (Portugal), who days later signed for the Madrid. Madrid’s top was 8 in the 2020 edition (the Frenchmen Karim Benzema and Raphäel Varane, the Belgians Thibaut Courtois and Eden Hazard, the Croatian Modric, the Welshman Gareth Bale, the Austrian David Alaba and Kroos).
Eric, Pedri, Alba and Ferran move around on scooters at the Qatar-2022 concentration. / Pablo García
The 11 Barça players surpass the record of the 10 who participated in the 2000 Euro Cup.
In the last reference competition, the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, there were 13 members of the Madrid squad and 17 of Barcelona’s, the absolute record because the latest incorporation of Alejandro Balde after the injury of José Luis Gayà forced the tiebreaker with the 16 of Bayern Munich and Manchester City.
Then, Luis Enrique was the Spain coach and he trusted 8 Barça players. Two years later, he has changed benches. Back at a club, and in charge of Saint Germain, he will be worried about the physical condition of the 12 pupils who will compete in the tournament. One with Spain (Fabián Ruiz)five with France (Warren Zaire-Emery, Kylian Mbappe, Ousmane Dembélé, Randal Kolo Muani and Bradley Barcola), four with Portugal (Nuno Mendes, Danilo Pereira, Vitinha and Goncalo Ramos), Italian Gianluigi Donnarumma and Slovak Milan Skriniar.
Rodrigo, during the recent Spain-Northern Ireland. / Cati Cladera / Efe
None of Milan’s eight players are with Italy.
The last multinational with 12 footballers is City by Pep Guardiola. Just like PSG, with a minimum representation with Spain (Rodrigo) and English predominance (John Stones, Kyle Walker, Phil Foden), double footprint in Croatia (Josko Gvardiol, Mateo Kovacic), Belgium (Kevin De Bruyne, Jérémy Doku) and Portugal (Rúben Dias, Bernardo Silva) and singular in Switzerland (Manuel Akanji) and Netherlands (Nathan Aké).
Bayern, Leipzig and Arsenal will have 11 representatives, like Barça after the loss of De Jong. Those from Leipzig – among them, Dani Olmo – belong to eight different countries. Roma is the second Italian club behind Inter with 10 and Juventus, giving up 9 players. None of Milan’s eight players are with Italy.
2024-06-12 05:01:31
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