Barça tops in Euro 2008 representation

Barça is one of the clubs to have the most players taking part in Euro 2008. There will be eight Barça players in Switzerland and Austria (including the recently-transferred Zambrotta) the same number as Real Madrid, Bremen and Bayern.

Of the 368 players in the 16 finalised squads, no fewer than eight (including the recently-transferred Zambrotta) played for FC Barcelona throughout last season.  

The eight Barça players

Those players are Henry, Abidal and Thuram, all for France, who were originally in the shortlist of 29 players named by Doménech and have all been named in the eventual 23. Carles Puyol, Xavi and Andrés Iniesta will all appear for Luis Aragonés’s Spain, and Deco and Zambrotta will there for Portugal and Italy, respectively.

Real Madrid also taking eight

Madrid also have eight players in the European Championship, namely Iker Casillas and Sergio Ramos for Spain, Metzelder for Germany, Sneijder, Van Nistelrooy and Robben for Holland, Pepe for Portugal and Cannavaro for Italy.

The Germans

Werder Bremen and Bayern Munich can also boast eight players in the finals. Bayern have sent all of Philipp Lahm, Marcell Jansen, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Miroslav Klose, Lukas Podolski for Germany, plus, Luca Toni with Italy and Willy Sagnol and Frank Ribéry with France.

The eight Werder Bremen players are Martin Harnik, with host nation Austria, Clemens Fritz, Per Mertesacker, Torsten Frings and Tim Borowski, with Germany, Markus Rosenberg with Sweden, Ivan Klasnic with Croatia and Hugo Almeida with Portugal.