Football Legends Through the Decades
Every era of football has its defining players, and every era judged them differently. This guide walks through the decades — the stars, the awards that crowned them and the way the game around them changed — to explain how a great player becomes a legend.
What makes a legend?
Trophies matter, but they are not the whole story: plenty of serial winners are not remembered as legends, and some legends won relatively little. The players who last in football's memory usually combine three things — sustained excellence over many seasons, decisive moments on the biggest stages, and a style or influence that changed how others played. Awards are the most visible record of the first two.
A short history of the Ballon d'Or
The Ballon d'Or was created in 1956 by the French magazine France Football, and Stanley Matthews won the first one. For almost four decades it was open only to European players, which is why Pelé and Diego Maradona never won it during their careers. In 1995 eligibility was widened to any player at a European club, and George Weah of Liberia became the first non-European winner. From 2007 any player in the world could be considered.
FIFA ran a separate World Player of the Year award from 1991. The two were merged as the FIFA Ballon d'Or between 2010 and 2015, then separated again in 2016, when FIFA launched The Best awards. A women's Ballon d'Or was added in 2018, won first by Ada Hegerberg.
| Most Ballon d'Or wins | Wins |
|---|---|
| Lionel Messi | 8 |
| Cristiano Ronaldo | 5 |
| Johan Cruyff | 3 |
| Michel Platini | 3 |
| Marco van Basten | 3 |
The 1950s and 1960s: the first global stars
The first great era of European club football belonged to Real Madrid, who won the first five European Cups, led by Alfredo Di Stéfano and, from 1958, Ferenc Puskás. Internationally, the 1958 World Cup introduced a 17-year-old Pelé, who went on to win three World Cups. Lev Yashin, the Soviet goalkeeper, remains the only keeper to have won the Ballon d'Or (1963), and Eusébio of Benfica and Portugal was the top scorer at the 1966 World Cup.
The 1970s: total football and the Kaiser
Johan Cruyff led Ajax to three consecutive European Cups (1971–73) and won three Ballons d'Or, becoming the face of the Dutch "total football". His great rival was Franz Beckenbauer, who reinvented the sweeper's role, captained West Germany to the 1974 World Cup and Bayern Munich to three straight European Cups. Alongside him, Gerd Müller scored at a rate few have matched — 68 goals in 62 internationals.
The 1980s: Maradona, Platini and Van Basten
Michel Platini won three Ballons d'Or in a row (1983–85) and scored nine goals as France won Euro 1984. Diego Maradona carried Argentina to the 1986 World Cup and then led Napoli to their first two Serie A titles. At the end of the decade, Marco van Basten — scorer of the famous volley in the Euro 1988 final — became the spearhead of Arrigo Sacchi's AC Milan, before an ankle injury meant he played his last match at 28.
The 1990s: a global game
The 1990s brought stars from everywhere. Roberto Baggio won the Ballon d'Or in 1993, George Weah in 1995 and the Brazilian Ronaldo in 1997, aged 21. Zinedine Zidane, voted best player in 1998, scored twice in the World Cup final that year. The Bosman ruling of 1995 and the growth of television money made the top European clubs more international than ever.
2000s to 2020s: the Messi–Ronaldo era and after
Ronaldinho and Kaká defined the mid-2000s — Kaká's 2007 Ballon d'Or was the last before an extraordinary decade in which only Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo won it. Luka Modrić broke that sequence in 2018. Since then the award has gone to Messi (2019, 2021, 2023), Karim Benzema (2022), Rodri (2024) and Ousmane Dembélé (2025), while a new generation led by Kylian Mbappé and Erling Haaland has set scoring records of its own.
Beyond Europe and South America
For decades, the game's acknowledged greats came almost entirely from Europe and South America. That has changed. George Weah's Ballon d'Or in 1995 opened the door, and African stars such as Samuel Eto'o — a four-time African Footballer of the Year — Didier Drogba and Mohamed Salah became central figures at Europe's biggest clubs. In Asia, Son Heung-min shared the Premier League Golden Boot in 2021–22, a first for an Asian player.
Legends of the women's game
Women's football has its own pantheon. Brazil's Marta won six FIFA World Player of the Year awards and holds the Women's World Cup scoring record with 17 goals. The United States produced stars such as Mia Hamm and Abby Wambach, and more recently Spain's Alexia Putellas (2021 and 2022) and Aitana Bonmatí (2023, 2024 and 2025 — a record three in a row) won the Ballon d'Or Féminin, reflecting Spain's rise as the new force in the women's game.
One-club legends
Some legends are defined by loyalty. Paolo Maldini spent his entire 25-season career at AC Milan, Francesco Totti played his whole career for Roma, and Ryan Giggs made more than 900 appearances for Manchester United. In a game where players move more often than ever, a one-club career has become rarer — and more celebrated.
The 2020s generation
A new generation is already writing its own records. Kylian Mbappé became the World Cup's all-time top scorer in 2026 with 22 goals. Erling Haaland scored 36 Premier League goals in 2022–23, a record for a single season. Lamine Yamal won Euro 2024 with Spain at 17, having become the youngest scorer in the tournament's history, and players such as Jude Bellingham, Pedri and Jamal Musiala are shaping the decade's biggest teams.
How football remembers its legends
Legends live on beyond their playing days. Clubs retire shirt numbers, build statues and name stands after them; in 2020 the city of Naples renamed Napoli's stadium the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona after his death. Pelé's name even entered the Portuguese language: in 2023 a leading Brazilian dictionary added "pelé" as an adjective meaning exceptional or incomparable. These tributes are a reminder that a legend's status is decided not only by statistics but by what a player meant to the people who watched him.
Comparing across eras
Comparing players from different decades is the oldest argument in football. The game has changed: pitches are better, training and nutrition are scientific, tackles that were once routine now earn red cards, and today's stars play far more televised matches. The fairest approach is to ask how far a player stood above the best of his own time — which is why Pelé, Cruyff, Maradona and Messi keep appearing in the same sentence despite playing in very different worlds.