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#8 Jean-Pierre Papin
One of four Frenchmen ever to win the Ballon d’Or, Papin was the game’s premier striker in the early part of the 1990s. Having emerged at Valenciennes then flourished in Belgium with Club Brugge, he excelled with Marseille and won the game’s greatest individual prize in 1991 after a blistering season.
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AC Milan moved to sign him for a world record fee at the time, around £10 million, but while he scored 20 goals in his first season in Serie A, he never settled and was moved on to Bayern Munich. He never quite regained the lustre of the early part of his career, in which he became synonymous with incredible acrobatic volleys.
He was also unfortunate to find himself in the France team when it was at a particularly low ebb, flopping at Euro 92 and failing to qualify for World Cup 94.
Nevertheless, there was no doubting Papin’s talents.
