1. Nottingham Forest 1977 - 1978
Forest promoted as 3rd place of second tier in English league system in 1976 - 1977 season. Before that, they consecutively played in top tier 15 seasons between 1957 to 1972. Beyond miracle, Who imagined that they could win the top flight title when Liverpool was spending their peak years with statistics unbeaten at home matches ! This is considered as the most skipped performance in history of club football. The team comprised only 3 international players are are Peter Shilton who was arguably an only world-class player in this team, Archie Gemmell from Scotland and Martin O'Neil from Northern Ireland.
2. Hellas Verona 1984 - 1985
Hellas Verona finished 8th in 1983 - 1984 season. During 1980s, Series A is the most competitive league in Europe, people just speculated Torino, Juventus, AC Milan, Inter Milan or AS Roma to have a chance but at its 14th Series A season, Hellas Verona defeated a ton of great teams and lost only 2 games and incredibly came the first place ! The team was led by foreign international stars like Elkjaer and Hans Peter Briegel. The rest of the team all are Italian who was never called for Caps.
3. Leicester City 2015 - 2016
In the modern era of English football, it become less
possible for smaller clubs to overthrow Top European clubs but Leicester made
it wonderfully with only 3 games loss. The club made only 14th place in the previous season and was just promoted in the season before that. Riyad Mahrez, N'Kolo Kante and Jamie Vardy are main superstars of the team. However, there was only Kasper Schmeichel who was an international player before the season started.
4. Ipswich Town 1961 - 1962
Ipswich never played in top flight before the 1961 - 1962 season but the club won immediately won the title despite its first attempt. If track back to its history, they're a regular member of Division III in the first decade of post-war era and played in Division II only 4 seasons before experience promotion ! However, the standard of competition was questionable as Ipswich lost 10 matches and got only 56 points from 42 games !
5. Central Espanol 1984
Central Espanol was a member in Uruguayan Top league 3 seasons only (1962, 1972, 1973) prior to 1984. Particularly, the club finished the last place in 1972 but no relegation rule at that season. Penarol and Nacional were one of the leading clubs in the world at that time but a new promoted Central Espanol acquire the trophy with more 1 point than Penarol. Before that, only Defensor Sporting could win a champion in 1976. There was no player from central Espanol in 1983 Copa America Uruguay squad.
6. Manchester City 1937 - 1938
Man City just won its first ever English top league title in 1936 - 1937 season. The club still has the same entire set of players starting eleven led by Frank Swift, Peter Doherty and Eric Brook but finished season at 21th place in the following season and relegated to Second Tier after played in Top flight in consecutive 10 seasons. This is considered as the most fluctuated performance in the football league history.
7. Tottenham 1950 - 1951
The club was in English second tier from 1935 to 1950 across the war times and previously played in top flight 16 seasons. Tottenham amazed English football when they won the title upon its promotion. Despite, the club was just promoted, there were 3 international players in the team, Ted Ditchburn, Alf Ramsey and Ron Burgress.
8. Boavista 2000 - 2001
Definitely Boavista could make the Primera liga more attractive when it went beyond the rule of top 3 reservation and suddenly defeated Porto just 1 point. In history, there is only another time that winner were not top 3, Belenense made it in 1946. Boavista started as a regular member of the top flight since 1970s, before realizing champions, they used to finish second place twice. Although winning title, no players from Boavista is in top ten top scorer signifying the great teamwork. The team was led by an only international player of the team is Erwin Sanchez.
9. Kaiserslautern 1997 - 1998
Kaiser won Bundesliga in 1991. The club was then a new promoted team in 1997 - 1998 season after relegated the first time in history in previous two seasons, not like in England that there are 3 clubs in history to win the top flight when they're just promoted, Bundesliga has a less fluctuated when the higher gap between big and small clubs had been maintained. It just like a fairly-tale that Kaiser coincidentally won the title with the same W-D-L as they did in previous 2.Bundesliga season !. The team consists of 6 international players are Olaf Marschall, Pavel Kuka, Martin Wagner,Ciriaco Sforza, Mirsolav Kadlec and Andreas Brehme.
10. Wolfburg 2008 - 2009
Wolfburg was first promoted to Bundesliga in 1997 In its first ten seasons, Wolfburg sustained their status betwen 6th to 15th place in the league. Between 2005 and 2007, Wolfburg survived from relegation suddenly in two consecutive seasons but the next two seasons, the club won the Bundesliga title ! The team was led by two international stars Edin Dzeko and Grafrite but both just played only a few games for their nations prior to season begun.
11. Nuremberg 1968 - 1969
Nuremberg just won Bundesliga as its only national league winner in history in 1967 - 1968 season after playing in top level in consecutive 7 seasons. However, When the club changed only 3 starting players, the performance was dramatically dropped and finished at 17th place in the following season and relegated to Regionalliga Sud. This is considered as the highest drop performance in German football league history.
What about Montpellier 2011 -2012 ?
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