Top 1000: the best players in the French championship (560-551)
Who is the best player in the history of the French championship since its creation in 1932 until 2022? Statistics, records, personal trajectories, class, draws, imprint left: so many criteria that have enabled us to establish our very subjective ranking of the thousand most outstanding players in Division 1 and Ligue 1. The creed of a soap opera that goes last exactly 100 days.
Norbert Van Caeneghem
Excelsior Roubaix (1933-1935), CS Metz (1935-1936), SC Fives (1936-1942)
Sporting Club Fivois has not had the greatest longevity in France. Founded in 1901, SC Fives disappeared just before the end of the Second World War, in 1944, to merge with Olympique Lille and create what is now called LOSC. Because yes, in the 1930s, Lille had two clubs in the first division: Olympique Lille and SC Fives. If the latter has never done better than a second place in the French championship, he has nevertheless seen many great players. Among them, a certain Norbert Van Caeneghem who, after having enjoyed the heyday of Excelsior Roubaix and CS Metz, came to pile up the pawns with SC Fives. If the war came to stop the momentum of the one who had slammed 24 goals during the 1938-1939 season, it did not prevent him from becoming the top scorer in the history of SC Fives. A record that no one will ever be able to take away from him.
Yvan Lebourgeois
Caen (1988-1995)
In Caen, his name is exclusively associated with Stade Malherbe. He is Yvan Lebourgeois, emblem of the SMC and third most capped player of the club with 391 games (including 200 in the first division). Born in Calvados, this needy devotees a major part of his life to the Rouge et Bleu, after training at ASPTT Caen, of course.
Far from eyeing a career as a footballer, the one who was then an apprentice butcher was launched into the professional bath late in life, at the age of 23, in 1984:
“Before, I played in D4, at the PTT Caen. In the morning, I worked as a butcher. I started my days at 5 a.m.,
he detailed for
West France
.
This is where Pierre Mankowski, the Caen coach, spotted me.”
He then began as a striker, with a very stocky physique (1.81 meters for 80 kilos), within a…