Real Madrid

Spain · one of the six clubs in the Easy pool

No club has won the European Cup more often. Real Madrid won the first five, and in the Champions League era they have won more finals than anyone else. Strangely for a club so defined by Europe, they have never won the treble.

The story in brief

The 1950s and 1960s: Di Stéfano and the first five

The European Cup began in 1955–56 and Real Madrid won each of the first five editions. The side was built around Alfredo Di Stéfano, with Francisco Gento on the left wing and, from 1958, Ferenc Puskás. The 1960 final at Hampden Park, a 7–3 win over Eintracht Frankfurt in which Puskás scored four and Di Stéfano three, is still remembered as one of the great matches. A younger, almost all-Spanish team — the "Yé-yé" side, captained by Gento — won a sixth European Cup in 1966.

The 1980s: the Quinta del Buitre

The 1970s brought domestic titles but nothing in Europe. In the 1980s a group of youth-team graduates nicknamed the Quinta del Buitre — "the Vulture's cohort", after Emilio Butragueño — broke through alongside the Mexican striker Hugo Sánchez. They won five Liga titles in a row from 1986 to 1990 and two UEFA Cups, but never the European Cup.

1998 to now: the Champions League club

Predrag Mijatović's goal against Juventus in 1998 ended a 32-year wait for a seventh European Cup. Two more followed in 2000 and 2002, the second with Zinédine Zidane's volley against Bayer Leverkusen at Hampden, in the era of the Galácticos — Luís Figo, Zidane, Ronaldo and later David Beckham. The tenth, La Décima, came in 2014 against Atlético Madrid after Sergio Ramos equalised in stoppage time. With Cristiano Ronaldo, Luka Modrić and Toni Kroos, and Zidane now as coach, Madrid won three in a row from 2016 to 2018, and they won again in 2022 and 2024 under Carlo Ancelotti.

Real Madrid in Treble Winner

Madrid are one of the six Easy-pool clubs, so the reels can stop on them at every difficulty. Easy spins only their 1990s, 2000s and 2010s; Normal adds the 1980s and 2020s; Di Stéfano's 1960s and the 1970s are Hard only.

Real Madrid in the game's pool, decade by decade.
Decade	Players	Best-XI rating	Rank	First on	Highest rated in the game
1960s	68	79.5	27	Hard	Alfredo Di Stefano, Ferenc Puskas, Francisco Gento
1970s	52	76.5	80	Hard	Carlos Santillana, Pirri, Amancio Amaro
1980s	63	78.5	40	Normal	Hugo Sanchez, Emilio Butragueno, Michel Gonzalez
1990s	116	80.0	24	Easy	Fernando Hierro, Raúl, Hugo Sánchez
2000s	132	84.5	2	Easy	Ronaldo Nazario, Karim Benzema, Iker Casillas
2010s	136	83.1	3	Easy	Cristiano Ronaldo, Karim Benzema, Sergio Ramos
2020s	72	82.4	5	Normal	Kylian Mbappe, Thibaut Courtois, Vinicius Junior

The game rates Madrid's 2000s and 2010s as two of the strongest cells it has, and the 2020s are not far behind, which makes Madrid unusually reliable: almost any modern Madrid spin has a world-class player for most shirts. The thinnest decade is the 1970s, the gap between the Yé-yé team and the Quinta.

Drafting tips

Forwards are everywhere; defenders are scarcer. Madrid's highest-rated players are mostly attackers. A spin on Madrid with a centre-back shirt open is a good moment to take Fernando Hierro or Ramos.
Raúl and Casillas span decades. Both appear in the 1990s, 2000s and 2010s, so missing them once is not missing them for good.
On Hard, the 1960s are a prize. Di Stéfano and Puskás both played into the 1960s, so the cell gives you two of the best forwards in the history of the game.