2010 World's FLAIREST ever unit- nominations

[Brian Fantana]

I'm going to second the Newcastle 96 squad.

ALBERT
GINOLA
ASPRILLA

Enough said. Those three are all in my flair top 10 of all time.

 

[Scotty Mac]

the 2004 european champions - for being UTTER wank, being utterly unfancied and actually WINNING the whole thing

*smugremindertoturienzoslovechildthatitippedthemtowinitpriortothetournament*

 

[Colossal Squid]

OK so how about...

HOLLAND 1992:

Koeman
Bergkamp
Rijkaard
Van Basten
Gullit
Winter
De Boer

BAMMO

 

[Withdean Wanderer]

Derby County 98/99

Featuring:
Paulo Wanchope
Stefan Schnoor
Igor Stimac
Lars Bohinen
Stefano Eranio
Jacob Laursen
Mart Poom
Rory Delap
Francesco Baiano
Ron Willems
Horacio Angel Carbonari
Robert Kozluk

The old guard were replaced by ultimate flairists Esteban Fuertes, Georgi Kinkladze and Taribo West in later seasons...

 

[astevens76]

brighton and hove albion
november 2009 - ...

 

[Scotty Mac]

middlesbroughs 96-97 team - not only did they concede what was up until a year ago the quickest goal in fa cup final history, but they were packed through of flair icons who were MINT players yet bryan robson STILL managed to lead them to relegation. although admittedly part of the reason was that they didnt turn up for a game! their fa cup final line up has got flair written all over it:

GK 25 Ben Roberts
RB 14 Curtis Fleming
CB 5 Nigel Pearson
CB 18 Gianluca Festa
LB 17 Clayton Blackmore
RM 10 Juninho
CM 8 Robbie Mustoe
CM 6 Emerson
LM 20 Phil Stamp
CF 11 Fabrizio Ravanelli
CF 21 Craig Hignett
Substitutes:
DF 4 Steve Vickers
DF 7 Vladimír Kinder
FW 9 Mikkel Beck

and they then splashed out on gazza and paul merson to guarantee them promotion the following season - flairtastic scenes

 

[SirDouglasLoft]

Chelsea of the 2000-01 season, the names in the squad say it all:

Ed de Goeij
Christian Panucci
Celestine Babayaro
Frank Leboeuf
Marcel Desailly
Winston Bogarde
Gustavo Poyet
Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink
Slaviša Jokanović
Dennis Wise
Mario Stanić
Graeme Le Saux
Mario Melchiot
Roberto Di Matteo
Albert Ferrer
Jody Morris
Bernard Lambourde
Eiður Guðjohnsen
Carlo Cudicini
Samuele Dalla Bona
Gianfranco Zola
John Terry
Rati Aleksidze
Jesper Grønkjær
Jon Harley

I was just about to say this one! Seconded

Also Bolton Wanderes class of 2005:
NAKATA
OKOCHA
HIERRO

 

[Colossal Squid]

Derby County 98/99

Featuring:
Paulo Wanchope
Stefan Schnoor
Igor Stimac
Lars Bohinen
Stefano Eranio
Jacob Laursen
Mart Poom
Rory Delap
Francesco Baiano
Ron Willems
Horacio Angel Carbonari
Robert Kozluk

The old guard were replaced by ultimate flairists Esteban Fuertes, Georgi Kinkladze and Taribo West in later seasons...

Definitely seconding that. Wanchope, Bohinen and Eranio were SKILLZ

 

[Colossal Squid]

middlesbroughs 96-97 team - not only did they concede what was up until a year ago the quickest goal in fa cup final history, but they were packed through of flair icons who were MINT players yet bryan robson STILL managed to lead them to relegation. although admittedly part of the reason was that they didnt turn up for a game! their fa cup final line up has got flair written all over it:

GK 25 Ben Roberts
RB 14 Curtis Fleming
CB 5 Nigel Pearson
CB 18 Gianluca Festa
LB 17 Clayton Blackmore
RM 10 Juninho
CM 8 Robbie Mustoe
CM 6 Emerson
LM 20 Phil Stamp
CF 11 Fabrizio Ravanelli
CF 21 Craig Hignett
Substitutes:
DF 4 Steve Vickers
DF 7 Vladimír Kinder
FW 9 Mikkel Beck

and they then splashed out on gazza and paul merson to guarantee them promotion the following season - flairtastic scenes

HELL YEAH

Ben Roberts
Juninho
Emerson
Ravanelli
AND
Mikkel Beck

What's not to like?

 

[SNOOBS]

Coventry City Around 99/00 with the likes of
Youssef Chippo
Mustapha Hadji
John Aloisi
Darren Huckerby
Craig Bellamy
Robbie Keane
Jay Bothroyd
John Hartson
Magnus Hedman
Colin Hendry

and a couple of players called Zuniga and Guerrero

 

[sam86]

Perhaps a dodgy shout, as recent, and a bit GASH, but any team with the following starters is surely flair?

Current Real Madrid
- Ronaldo
- Kaka
- Benzema
- Higuaín
- Alonso
- Diarra (from Portsmouth to Madrid?!)
- Raul
- Ramos
- Pepe (whom, if you remember recently got banned for going NUTS and KICKING someone, hard, on purpose)
- Casillas

I was going to name a few, but have ended up posting almost the whole 11.

 

[Scotty Mac]

les invincibles...

 

[Mendoza]

Bergkamp
Vieira
Henry
Lehmann
PARLOUR

THE ARSENAL INVINCIBLES 2004

 

[Colossal Squid]

I'll second the Arsenal INVINCIBLES but I'm not going to sanction the inclusion of Real Madrid 2010

YOU CAN'T BUY FLAIR

 

[Withdean Wanderer]

Surely that Arsenal team were too consistently good to be considered the flairest ever?

As stated previously, Newcastle 96 actually score flair points for making a hash of it

 

[MattBackHome]

Liverpool 96

 

[Scotty Mac]

Surely that Arsenal team were too consistently good to be considered the flairest ever?

As stated previously, Newcastle 96 actually score flair points for making a hash of it

any team that has a firecracker like jens lehmann in it and STILL manages to go the entire season without losing a game deserves its place among the flair elite

 

[Gwylan]

Has to be the Dutch team in 1974: Cruyff, Rep, Neeskens, Krol, Resenbrink, Keizer, Jansen, the Van der Kerkhofs, Haan - the names trip off the tongue more than 35 years later. Totally flair.

 

[Colossal Squid]

Coventry City Around 99/00 with the likes of
Youssef Chippo
Mustapha Hadji
John Aloisi
Darren Huckerby
Craig Bellamy
Robbie Keane
Jay Bothroyd
John Hartson
Magnus Hedman
Colin Hendry

and a couple of players called Zuniga and Guerrero

That's actually a very good shout and I will CERTAINLY second that

I remember thinking John Aloisi was out of this world!

 

[itszamora]

Hungary circa 1950-54. By far the best team on the planet at that time, gaining flair points both for their playing style and the fact that the only game they lost between about '51 to '56 or something was the world cup final, blowing a 2-0 lead over a German team they were so much better than it physically hurt.

Additional points also awarded as their star player was fat, slow, one-footed and smoked 20+ a day, yet still lorded it over the other 21 players on the field with ease.

Plus it wasn't getting old, diminishing skills or even too many cigarettes than ended the reign - oh no, it was DEFECTION to the WEST. CAN YOU GET ANY MORE FLAIR THAN THAT?!