The greatest squads of the 1980s

The decade

This is the European Cup before it became the Champions League: champions only, straight knockout, no group stage and no second chances. It shows in who is here. Liverpool won a treble in 1983-84, and English clubs were then banned from European competition from 1985 — which is why one English side appears in this decade and no more. Into that gap came Steaua București, the first Eastern European winners of the European Cup, on four saved penalties; Dynamo Kyiv, taking the Cup Winners' Cup with Belanov on his way to the Ballon d'Or; and PSV's treble in 1987-88. The decade closes with Milan in 1988-89, the side every team of the next ten years was measured against.

Where the squads come from: England (1), Italy (1), Netherlands (1), Romania (1) and Ukraine (1). The highest-rated player of the era in this database is Marco van Basten (94), and 3 different players across these 5 squads are rated 90 or above.

Drafting the 1980s

The lowest-rated group in the database — about two and a half points below the 2010s squads on average — and the most top-heavy of the five decades: outside Milan's front three, Liverpool's forwards and Belanov, an 85 is a strong player here. It is also the only era you cannot isolate on the wheel, so landing on one of these sides is luck rather than choice, five sectors on a wheel that draws from everything.

There is no draft mode for this decade — the era pools start at 1990, and a pool needs at least six squads to be worth spinning. These sides appear on the full wheel instead, which is what a default run draws from. Four of the five belong to no pool at all, so this page is the only place they sit together.

However you narrow the wheel, the run itself is the same Champions League draft game: an XI built one spin at a time, then a league phase, two-legged knockouts and a final.