6 players we can’t believe have never scored a Champions League hat-trick
Some of modern football’s most lethal forwards have the unfortunate stat of having never managed to score a hat-trick in the Champions League.
Nicklas Bendtner might have made the art of scoring three goals under those bright, Gazprom lights look easy back in 2010 for Arsenal, but some players just clearly aren’t on the level of the lord after all. That, and the fact that football can sometimes be a very strange game.
The following six players have outstanding legacies in the game and can be considered among the best of their generation, but somehow never managed to score a Champions League hat-trick.
Arjen Robben
Despite cutting inside on his left foot and banging one past seemingly every goalkeeper he came up against domestically and in Europe, Robben never actually managed a hat-trick in the illustrious competition.
The Dutchman won the Champions League once in 2013 and made 110 appearances in the competition throughout his stellar career, scoring an impressive 31 goals despite being a winger – including the winner in said 2013 final against Borussia Dortmund.
No hat-tricks, though. Fraud watch.
Edinson Cavani
That’s right, even El Matador fell short of a hat-trick in UEFA’s top club competition, believe it or not. He’s the player with the third-most goals in the competition without ever scoring one (35).
The Uruguayan is Paris Saint-Germain’s second all-time top scorer and smashed them in wherever he played around Europe, doing so for both Napoli and Manchester United, but also never won the competition. Fine margins.
Thomas Muller
Cavani is second behind Muller who – at the time of writing – holds the unfortunate title of having scored the most Champions League goals without ever bagging a hat-trick (54).
Having won the competition on two occasions with Bayern Munich, the one club man won’t mind too much and still has plenty of time to rid himself of the unwanted statistic. However, now sharing scoring duties with Harry Kane, he might struggle.
Antoine Griezmann
A truly remarkable footballer who’s somehow now enjoying what appears to be the second peak of his career, Griezmann has pipped Cavani to become the player with the second-most Champions League goals without bagging a hat-trick in the competition with 37.
Given his clutch abilities and his range of finishing for both club and country, it’s mind-boggling to think that none of his five career hat-tricks have come in the Champions League for Atletico Madrid.
There’s still time for that to change, however.
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Eden Hazard
Not only did Hazard never score a hat-trick in the Champions League, he only ever actually scored 10 times in the competition, assisting a further 15 from 61 appearances.
That’s a mightily surprising stat for such a glorious player in his peak. It’s not like he wasn’t capable of them, either. The Belgian winger scored them on several occasions and in style for Chelsea, while also famously showing up still drunk for Lille and putting one past Nancy. Some player.
Luis Suarez
Yes, really. Suarez, who is widely recognised as one of the game’s greatest strikers and for good reason, never managed a Champions League hat-trick.
With 27 goals and 25 assists from just 73 games in the competition, his firing rate is reflective of his ridiculously prolific career at the top level. He won the competition in his first season at Barcelona, but never managed to eclipse that and actually struggled for goals in Europe as the years went on.
Now in Miami with Lionel Messi, it’s extremely unlikely that he’ll come back to Europe to get himself off this list.