The 8 miracles in football history 🪄

Sometimes, when everything seems decided, miracles happen to offer us matches with completely crazy scenarios.

Just like those that occur in Christmas movies, OneFootball has ranked the best football miracles for you.

1. The “Miracle of Istanbul” – Liverpool achieves the impossible comeback (2005)

Trailing 3-0 at halftime against Ancelotti's Milan, the Reds made a comeback in six minutes before winning on penalties. Gerrard, Dudek, and the Anfield Road anthem created the greatest resurrection of the modern era.

2. Leicester City, English champions (2016)

Odds of 5000 to 1. With a budget far below Tottenham, City, United, Chelsea, and Arsenal, Leicester managed to be crowned in the most competitive league in the world. Jamie Vardy, Riyad Mahrez, N’Golo Kanté: a band of underdogs that set the football world on fire.

3. Greece wins the Euro (2004)

Nobody expected them to get past the group stage. Otto Rehhagel transformed them into an impenetrable defensive wall. Greece eliminated Zidane's France, Nedvěd's Czech Republic, and then Cristiano Ronaldo's Portugal… on home soil. A perfect, cold, surgical heist.

4. Barça's comeback against Paris: the “Remontada” (2017)

After losing 4-0 in Paris, FC Barcelona achieved a legendary 6-1 victory. Neymar as the conductor, Sergi Roberto as the eternal hero. Paris thought they had killed the suspense: they signed one of the greatest tragic stories in football.

5. Kaiserslautern, champions after promotion from D2 (1998)

Freshly promoted, Rehhagel's FCK (him again!) won the Bundesliga the following year. A statistical anomaly in modern football, never repeated since. Neither Bayern Munich nor Bayer Leverkusen could stop the red devils.

6. The Korean miracle at the World Cup (2002)

Not without controversy, South Korea defeated Totti's Italy and then Raúl's Spain to reach the semi-finals of their World Cup.

7. Mbappé's double in the final (World Cup 2022)

Trailing 2-0 with ten minutes to the final whistle, Mbappé turned the final around in 94 seconds. The French striker sent Les Bleus into extra time when everything seemed set for Argentina. We witnessed two more goals in this extraordinary yet cruel final (3-3, 4-2 on penalties).

8. An amateur club in the French Cup final (2000)

Les Herbiers, Carquefou, Quevilly... the exploits of amateur clubs are recurrent in the history of the French trophy, but the most impressive surely took place in 2000. At the time, Calais, a 4th division club, managed to reach the final by eliminating two Ligue 1 clubs. Unfortunately for them, the amateurs were defeated by Nantes in the final (2-1).

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇫🇷 here.

📸 Laurence Griffiths - 2017 Getty Images