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Which regular runners-up have suffered the most heartbreak in football?

“Fenerbahçe have finished runners-up for the fourth season in a row and 26th time in the Turkish top flight (since 1959),” weeps Emre Öztürk. “Which teams have been runners-up most times? Is my team second in that list, too?”

Fear not, Emre: Fenerbahçe are among the also-rans in this particular competition. But they are Turkey’s greatest runners-up: they’ve assumed the position 30 times overall, 26 since the introduction of the Süper Lig in 1959. That puts them well clear of Galatasaray (19 overall, 11 since 1959) and Besiktas (19/14).

We actually had this question last year, so we’ve varied it slightly by calculating a kind of heartbreak ratio of second- to first-place finishes. The bigger the number, the sadder the heart.

To satisfy the sample size mafia, of which The Knowledge is an unashamed member, we’ve produced two different lists. (Well, there are three but we’ll get to the third one later.) The first is for the heavyweight contenders, the teams in double figures for both first and second-place finishes. The second is a free-for-all.

Of the heavyweights, Zamalek have the most consistent hard-luck story. They’ve been champions of Egypt on 14 occasions and runners-up a whopping 34 times, including eight in a nine-year period from 1978-87.

2.43 Zamalek (Egypt, runners-up 34 times: champions 14)
1.38 Feyenoord (Netherlands, 22:16)
1.35 Panathinaikos (Greece, 27:20)
1.27 Levski Sofia (Bulgaria, 33:26)
1.26 Club Brugge (Belgium, 24:19)
1.15 Cerro Porteño (Paraguay, 39:34)
1.07 Fenerbahçe (Turkey, 30:28)

Women’s teams didn’t appear on the above list because men’s leagues have been around for so much longer, but the runaway leaders in our second table come from the Première Ligue. Spare a thought for Paris Saint-Germain, who have had the misfortune to complete with Lyon for the last 15 years. In that period PSG have won one title and finished second on 12 occasions. For good measure, Lyon beat them on penalties in the 2017 Champions League final.

Of those with more than one title to their name, Roma and Aberdeen (both men’s teams) have the worst ratio we could find. They have both been runners-up n-i-n-e times since their last title. And if you take out the Alex Ferguson era, Aberdeen have a William G Stewart heartbreak ratio, 15:1

12.00 Paris Saint-Germain Women (France, 12:1)
7.00 Motherwell (Scotland, 7:1)
6.00 Gimnasia y Esgrima (Argentina, 6:1), Manchester City Women (England, 6:1)
5.00 Lens (France, 5:1)
4.67 Roma (Italy, 14:3)
4.25 Aberdeen (Scotland, 17:4)

Last but not least, the obligatory Big Five Leagues table. Same rules as the first: only teams with at least 10 first- and second-place finishes are eligible.

1.50 Marseille (France, 15:10)
1.00 Barcelona (Spain, 28:28)
0.92 Arsenal (England, 12:13)
0.91 Atlético Madrid (Spain, 10:11)
0.89 Milan (Italy, 17:19)
0.85 Manchester United (England, 17:20), Internazionale (Italy, 17:20)
0.75 Liverpool (England, 15:20)
0.72 Real Madrid (Spain, 26:36)
0.58 Juventus (Italy, 21:36)
0.29 Bayern Munich (Germany, 10:34)

No wonder Thomas Tuchel was on the market.

Rotterdam, or anywhere…

“Has any team done a full Beautiful South during European competition?” asks Sean Boiling. “That means playing in ‘Rotterdam, or anywhere, Liverpool or Rome’ in that order (ignoring the ‘or’)?”

The short answer is ‘not yet’. But the longer answer is worth sticking around for because Pete Tomlin and Robbie Dale have done sterling work in the name of trivia.

“Having trawled through every season of every European competition,” begins Pete, and let’s just pause to consider how much work that entailed, “I am confident that no side has ever achieved this feat. The closest any team came to doing a Beautiful South is Manchester City in the 2017-18 Champions League.

“Their first group match was in Rotterdam against Feyenoord. They then played in Naples and Donetsk, which covers the ‘anywhere’. After beating Basel in the last 16 they were drawn against Liverpool, who beat them 5-1 on aggregate. Had City gone through they would have played AS Roma in the semi-finals, which would have completed the Beautiful South set!”

Though the question was about clubs, one member of that Liverpool side managed to complete the sequence. “Had a long conversation about music with my plumber, a former drummer, this morning, and we were sharing our admiration for Paul Heaton,” writes Robbie Dale. “So I felt compelled to answer this when I read it.

“Georginio Wijnaldum started his career at Feyenoord, then played for PSV Eindhoven and Newcastle (anywhere). In 2016 he moved to Liverpool, where he won the Premier League and Champions League before leaving for PSG in 2021. Then, in 2022-23 he was loaned to AS Roma.

“Not perfect, but pretty nice.”

Kings of three continents

“Édouard Mendy and Riyad Mahrez have won continental championships – for club or country – in three different confederations: the Africa Cup of Nations (Senegal and Algeria respectively), the Uefa Champions League (Chelsea/Manchester City) and now the AFC Champions League Elite (Al-Ahli). Has any other player in history achieved a similar ‘triple crown’?” wonders Ben.

Dirk Maas has done the work on this one. He reminds us that Roberto Firmino, who won the Copa América and Champions League in 2019, completed the triple crown at the same time as his Al-Ahli teammates Mendy and Mahrez.

He also dug out a much earlier case which is worth a mention even if it doesn’t quite satisfy Ben’s criteria for the triple crown. Cameroon forward Joseph-Désiré Job, once of Middlesbrough, won the Africa Cup of Nations in 2000 and the AFC Champions League with Al-Ittihad in 2005. By that stage he already had won a European competition during his time in France with Lyon. Alas it wasn’t the big one, or even a medium one: Lyon joined Bastia and Auxerre as Intertoto Cup winners in 1997. A hat-trick for French football, but no triple crown for Job.

Knowledge archive

“Watching Arsenal thump Wigan at the Emirates Stadium on Saturday, I noticed that Chris Kirkland was wearing a cap,” said Gunther Lindley in 2009. “Have there ever been any high-profile outfield players who preferred to wear a cap while playing? Would this even be legal?”

Stuart Gardner pointed out that this has been answered in You are the Ref, in which the referees’ chief Keith Hackett confirmed that, even if the cap fits, you’re not allowed to wear it.

Tell the player to remove the cap or leave the pitch: it does not conform to the laws of the game. Goalkeepers have been allowed to wear caps of various designs for many years: remember Bert Trautmann?

Yet it seems that players are permitted to wear other forms of headgear. Take the Petr Cech-style skull cap, which has also been sported by the Charlton centre-back Miguel Llera. Such protection was also seen on the Irish international Tommy Priestley, who played for Chelsea in the 1930s – yet our own Paul Doyle explained that Priestley did not wear it to protect his skull but to cover his baldness.

Other examples include Bury’s Efe Sodje, who wore a bandana matching his kit for over a decade, Marseille’s Karim Ziani, Severino Varela and the Iran women’s team. Yet perhaps the best of all came from Algy Taylor. “In a famous incident (among Villa fans) in a league match in 1901, Aston Villa played Sheffield United in atrocious conditions, with players on both sides suffering from frostbite,” he said. “Villa’s legendary winger and England international Charlie Athersmith borrowed an umbrella from one of the spectators. Such was the awesomeness of the man that he even scored a goal with umbrella in hand.” And to think some people say old football was rubbish.

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Can you help?

“Spurs sacked Ange Postecoglou on Friday, seven days after their parade to celebrate winning the Europa League. Has a manager ever been sacked so soon after an open-top bus tour?” asks Nick Voss.

“During the Liechtenstein v Scotland game there was a reference to Billy Gilmour scoring more goals for Scotland (2) than his various clubs (0). But has a recognised striker ever finished their career with more goals for their country than their clubs?” asks Stuart McLagan.

“Scott Carson has just left Manchester City with a record of 11 trophies from two appearances totalling 117 minutes of football. Has anyone else managed such an impressive haul for so little competitive action?” asks Alex Slater.

“Both French Open finals were contested between the top two seeds,” notes Thomas Bickley. “This got me thinking about whether that had ever happened with the men’s and women’s FA Cup finals. The closest I’ve found is 2006-2007, where Chelsea (2nd) beat Man Utd (1st) in the men’s final and Arsenal (1st) beat Charlton in the women’s.”