Which country...

[Peter Doherty (AGAIG)]

The Netherlands, for more than 40 years.

[Chinners]

presumably, the republic of ireland being mentioned above is a piss take??

over the last 40 odd years, i'd go with the argies and dutch

Ireland have a good record of qualifying for tournaments, especially compared to the Scots, who have a bigger population. Plus quite a lo of Irish players have played in the CL.

As for Spain, they have about 40-50 excellent players at present but that's not always been the case.

half of ireland's players [strike]have come through the[/strike] were english/scottish [strike]systems[/strike] and not good enough for those sides so they looked for/made-up a long lost great grandfather ... twice removed...

Spain, Sweden and Holland for me

[gillie]

Uruguay has to be up there they only have about 6 million population iirc.

[Peter Doherty (AGAIG)]

Uruguay has to be up there they only have about 6 million population iirc.

Three-and-a-half million (not including Luis Suarez).

[bhfanatic]

Spain

[BobbyJ1956]

Used to be Scotland.
Argentina now.

[kinkylola]

definitely not the USA.

argentina (40 million) is fucking massive compared to Uruguay (3m), Denmark (5.5m) and Portugal (10m), Beglium (11m) and Netherlands (15m).

I think if you really take size into account, you have to put Uruguay at least on par with Argentina. If you run down the list of argentinian players, yea it's like a all world all-star team, but Uruguay are no pushovers and have some very good players of their own from a pool not even 1/10th the size. I think Denmark is also pretty impressive given their size and for current crop of potential stars, I would put Belgium up there as well.

This is how I'd place it relative to size and quality of players produced.

Uruguay/Argentina
Belgium
Denmark
Netherlands (argument to be had about suriname, antilles, etc ...)
Portugal
.
.
.
(Bottom 3)
USA
China
India

edit: interesting thought though is that denmark and belgium especially, have seen a lot of first team players developed through the dutch youth system.

[Alex Sapphire]

Uruguay has to be up there they only have about 6 million population iirc.

Three-and-a-half million (not including Luis Suarez).

smallest (least populous) country to win a World Cup

[Alioune DVToure]

Mexico has to be up (down) there with the worst. A football-loving nation of about 120 million people and - Olympic win aside - they've been pretty poor for as long as I can remember.

[kinkylola]

Probably put them with the USA ... above or below I don't think it makes a difference. When we play each other it's pretty much home side wins, but we've beaten them in the WC in South Korea/Japan ... we do have 3x their population, though it's nowhere near our favorite sport as a nation.

[Alex Sapphire]

Probably put them with the USA ... above or below I don't think it makes a difference. When we play each other it's pretty much home side wins, but we've beaten them in the WC in South Korea/Japan ... we do have 3x their population, though it's nowhere near our favorite sport as a nation.

well thanks for making the time :)

[kinkylola]

Probably put them with the USA ... above or below I don't think it makes a difference. When we play each other it's pretty much home side wins, but we've beaten them in the WC in South Korea/Japan ... we do have 3x their population, though it's nowhere near our favorite sport as a nation.

well thanks for making the time :)

well personally, I quite like it! But you're certainly welcome for the time :)

[Avalon]

Not sure of the answer for this, but the netherlands cant really be counted!
Most of the top players are from Suriname but chose to play for the netherlands!

Royston Drenthe, Ruud Gullit, Frank Rijkaard, Edgar Davids, Clarence Seedorf, Andwélé Slory, Ryan Babel, Aron Winter, Romeo Castelen, and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink (lifted the list from wiki as I couldn't remember them all)

I am not sure which ones were born in suriname or from suriname descent.....but you get my point.

Kluivert
Reiziger
Bogarde
Taument
Blinker
Melchiot
Zuiverloon
Emnes
and of course our very own NIGE

Drenthe: Born in Rotterdam
Gullit: Born in Amsterdam
Davids: Born in Paramaribo
Seedorf: Born in Paramaribo
Slory: Born in Paramaribo
Babel: Born in Amsterdam
Winter: Born in Paramaribo
Castelen: Born in Paramaribo
Hasselbaink: Born in Paramaribo
Kluivert: Born in Amsterdam
Reiziger: Born in Amstelveen
Bogarde: Born in Rotterdam
Taument: Born in the Hague
Blinker: Born in Paramaribo
Melchiot: Born in Amsterdam
Zuiverloon: Born in Rotterdam
Emnes: Born in Rotterdam

Aside from that, how many of these players are actually considered great players? Slory? Castelen? Drenthe? Come on guys!

Also, considering that the majority were born in the Netherlands, doesn't mean Suriname produced them, just cause they have a parent from that country. Plus, they have all one thing in common, they were all trained in the Netherlands, bar maybe Jimmy Floyd.

For me it's Argentina and the Netherlands. Even players like Bergkamp, van persie, Sneijder, van der Vaart, Robben and the new generation coming along, Clasie, van Wolfswinkel, de Vrij and Martins Indi are a few I can quickly think of.

[Green & Blue]

If we are talking size and population the following have all produced decent players Wales, Rep of Ireland, Scotland, Denmark and Croatia.In fairness none of those teams have had much success on the pitch bar the Danes at the Euros.

The obvious winners are Uruguay for a country with a population of just 3.3 million they have won the copa america a record 15 times and twice won the world cup.Quite incredible really for such a small country.

[Rag_hater]

definitely not the USA.

argentina (40 million) is fucking massive compared to Uruguay (3m), Denmark (5.5m) and Portugal (10m), Beglium (11m) and Netherlands (15m).

I think if you really take size into account, you have to put Uruguay at least on par with Argentina. If you run down the list of argentinian players, yea it's like a all world all-star team, but Uruguay are no pushovers and have some very good players of their own from a pool not even 1/10th the size. I think Denmark is also pretty impressive given their size and for current crop of potential stars, I would put Belgium up there as well.

This is how I'd place it relative to size and quality of players produced.

Uruguay/Argentina
Belgium
Denmark
Netherlands (argument to be had about suriname, antilles, etc ...)
Portugal
.
.
.
(Bottom 3)
USA
China
India

edit: interesting thought though is that denmark and belgium especially, have seen a lot of first team players developed through the dutch youth system.

Portugal iMO have to be considered.

[Alioune DVToure]

Portugal iMO have to be considered.

I agree. They don't just qualify for every tournament; they tend to be among the favourites once they get there and usually make it to the quarters/semi.

Still, they remain completely incapable of producing an international class centre-forward. I've never understood why.

[Alioune DVToure]

How about Iceland? A tiny country in terms of population and yet they've produced a string of top-flight players - and two very good ones in Eidur Gudjohnsen and Jussi Jaaskalinen (he is Icelandic, right?).

Finnish. Ah well.

[BlueinBosnia]

At the moment, Montenegro. Currently ranked 44th in the world, and rising, with a population of just under 650,000.

[I Just Blue Myself]

Was just going to mention them.

Savicevic
Mijatovic
Vucinic
Jovetic
Vukcevic
Basa

and last but not least one fondly remembered Stefan Savic.

[Ted Hughes]

Not sure of the answer for this, but the netherlands cant really be counted!
Most of the top players are from Suriname but chose to play for the netherlands!

Royston Drenthe, Ruud Gullit, Frank Rijkaard, Edgar Davids, Clarence Seedorf, Andwélé Slory, Ryan Babel, Aron Winter, Romeo Castelen, and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink (lifted the list from wiki as I couldn't remember them all)

I am not sure which ones were born in suriname or from suriname descent.....but you get my point.

Kluivert
Reiziger
Bogarde
Taument
Blinker
Melchiot
Zuiverloon
Emnes
and of course our very own NIGE

Drenthe: Born in Rotterdam
Gullit: Born in Amsterdam
Davids: Born in Paramaribo
Seedorf: Born in Paramaribo
Slory: Born in Paramaribo
Babel: Born in Amsterdam
Winter: Born in Paramaribo
Castelen: Born in Paramaribo
Hasselbaink: Born in Paramaribo
Kluivert: Born in Amsterdam
Reiziger: Born in Amstelveen
Bogarde: Born in Rotterdam
Taument: Born in the Hague
Blinker: Born in Paramaribo
Melchiot: Born in Amsterdam
Zuiverloon: Born in Rotterdam
Emnes: Born in Rotterdam

Aside from that, how many of these players are actually considered great players? Slory? Castelen? Drenthe? Come on guys!

Also, considering that the majority were born in the Netherlands, doesn't mean Suriname produced them, just cause they have a parent from that country. Plus, they have all one thing in common, they were all trained in the Netherlands, bar maybe Jimmy Floyd.

For me it's Argentina and the Netherlands. Even players like Bergkamp, van persie, Sneijder, van der Vaart, Robben and the new generation coming along, Clasie, van Wolfswinkel, de Vrij and Martins Indi are a few I can quickly think of.

I would say there's as much a case for England producing top class players as Holland, over the last 30 odd years if you take away the great Dutch team of the 70's.

Since then, they have only produced a handful of top players, as have we. I know there is a much bigger population here, but we tend to view ourselves as having failed badly in that department. I recon the Dutch have failed too if you compare the 70's team to what has come since. Their teams have often been better than ours of course but so have Norway, Sweden & Denmark. We can't put a team togerther to save our lives.

Argentina are far superior at producing players imo & if not for nutjob managers, would have been much more successful as a team.