Which international player has the best strike rate against a single team?
“Former Dutch international John Bosman scored nine of his 17 (52.9%) international goals against one side, Cyprus. Has anyone with such a decent international return ever had a better strike-rate against a single team,” asks Mike Shaw.
“I would like to nominate former Danish international Sophus ‘Krølben’ (literally curly-legs) Nielsen who back in the good old amateur days of the early 20th century scored 11 of his 16 international goals against France (68.75%), all during the 1908 Olympic Games in London,” writes Flemming Orth. “For some reason, France fielded both their A and B sides, and on 19 October 1908 Denmark took on the B side and won 9–0 with Nielsen scoring a single goal. Three days later the French A team (who perhaps should have been the B team) were defeated 17–1 by Denmark, Nielsen scoring no fewer than 10 of the goals.
“Incidentally, the game against the French B side was Denmark’s first official international match, so we were off to a flying start, eventually finishing as silver medalists in the 1908 Olympics, a feat repeated four years later (when Nielsen added another two goals, both against Norway).”
“This answer may be slightly off topic since its not a full international goal record,” begins Ahmad Akmal, “but Erling Haaland did score nine goals for Norway Under-20s against Honduras in the 2019 U20 World Cup. Given his total goals for the U-20s is 11 in five caps, that means his strike rate is a staggering 81.8% against one side.”
All roads usually lead to Archie Thompson when it comes to questions involving high scoring, but in this case the former Australia international does not top the pile. “Of his 28 international goals, 13 came in the record-breaking 31-0 win against American Samoa, or 46.4% of his total,” offers Calem Martin. And many readers wrote in to point out that Malcolm MacDonald got five of his six England goals (83.3%) against Cyprus.
More supreme feats in humiliating defeats
Following on from last week’s entry, Jordi Gómez has written in with a belting example from Spain that just about ticks the box for humiliation given the nature of the comeback. “One of the most legendary matches in Copa del Rey history had Milinko Pantic scoring four goals and still losing.
“Atlético v Barcelona in 1997, the champions against last year’s finalists. After a 2-2 draw in the first leg, everything seemed settled when Pantic put Atlético 3-0 ahead inside half an hour. Bobby Robson didn’t wait for half time to bring the cavalry on, though. After two goals from Ronaldo, Pantic added a fourth to make it 4-2. Barça kept attacking, though, and three goals in the last 25 minutes completed a 5-4 comeback win. Despite the involvement of so many footballing legend, the match is remembered as Pizzi’s day, since he scored the winning goal, sending the Catalan radio commentator into giddy raptures, screaming in Argentinian Spanish: “Pizzi sos macanudo!” (Pizzi you’re effing awesome!)” The ‘91 club’
Last week we determined that Notts County are the only team to have played the current 92 league clubs, owing to the fact they are not currently part of the 92. We’ve had a few more emails on the subject of members of the ‘91 club’.
“Further to the question about the 92 I can confirm Richard Gunn’s suspicion that Wrexham have not played all of the teams in the new season’s Premier League ... but it is agonisingly close,” writes Liam Hughes. “As far as I can ascertain from my own memories of supporting the club for over 30 years, Wikipedia entries from our four seasons in Division Two (which just happened to end in ignominious relegation mere months before I was born – typical, eh?) and stats from the ever-useful 11v11.com, we are only missing a competitive fixture against Leeds United to complete the set.”
And Stuart Silvers has this to offer. “Last season Port Vale became the only club to have beaten all the other current 91 in a league match when they beat Harrogate Town on 5 April. They lost that record when Sutton were promoted – but will of course regain it if they beat Sutton home or away this season.”
Knowledge archive
“John Ashdown, in his excellent recent blog on Burton, stated that their run of 11 successive seasons of improvement (with one aberration) might be a record. Surely it can’t be?” wrote Andrew Pechey in September 2010.
Accrington Stanley could match Burton’s record at the time of writing, and eventually surpassed it. Since their relegation from the Unibond Premier in 1999, Stanley improved year on year with, like Albion, just one season of stagnation – and even then it can be argued they went one better than the Brewers, failing to improve on their 10th-place finish in the 2003-04 Conference, but winning more points in finishing in the same position in 2004-05. The club’s forward momentum became gradual – they had finished 17th, 16th and 15th in League Two – but they came fifth in 2010-11 to make it 12 consecutive seasons of improvement, before falling back to 14th the following year.
Can you help?
“Now that Lionel Messi and Sergio Ramos are playing together at PSG, it made me wonder: do they hold the record for the two players who have played the most competitive matches against each other before playing on the same team,” wonders Alex Batchen.
“Gerard Moreno just became Villarreal’s all-time goalscorer on 83 goals, which seems surprisingly low,” writes George. “Are there any clubs with lower record scorers?”
“Have Queen’s Park of Scotland ever played Queen’s Park Rangers, either competitively or in a friendly? And were any royals present,” asks Eastlygod.
“It’s now 19 years since the transfer window system was introduced, so are there any players still playing who made a transfer before August 2002 at a time (eg in November) when they wouldn’t be able to move clubs now,” asks Chris Lutton.
“Every year Alderney enters the Channel Islands’ Muratti Vase alongside Jersey and Guernsey. They contest the semi-final each year against one of the other two larger islands in rotation,” begins John Lewis. “Alderney last won a match in 1920 (when they went on to win the whole tournament). That means their winless run spans over a century and almost 100 games. Can any other team boast a longer winless streak in an annual competition, either in terms of the number of games or length of time?”
“The opening weekend of the Premier League has resulted in precisely no draws, meaning the top 10 all have three points and the bottom 10 all have zero. Has this ever happened in the English top flight before,” asks Jake Lennon (and many others).
Email your questions and answers to knowledge@theguardian.com or tweet @TheKnowledge_GU.