Allan Simonsen

Simonsen's 1977 award remains one of the Ballon d'Or's great acts of insubordination: a Dane, at unfashionable Borussia Mönchengladbach, out-polling Keegan's Hamburg and Platini's rising France. The previous season he had scored in the European Cup final against Liverpool — a match Gladbach lost, as they lost that final twice, an entire era's worth of near-misses, with Simonsen's goal the eternal bright edge of them.

He won the UEFA Cup with Gladbach in 1975 and 1979, and later in Barcelona's colours reached another European final, scoring there too. For Denmark he played twenty years across two eras, amateur and professional, the bridge from an isolated football country to the one that would later produce Laudrup and Schmeichel — none of whom won what Simonsen won. He is still Denmark's only.