FIFA 20: Football fans have voted on the ultimate XI of ICON cards
One of the FIFA series' greatest ever decisions was introducing 'ICON' cards into their games.
Even though you know you're in dire straits if you're lining up against a player with plenty of them in their team, there's something beautiful about seeing old legends play with contemporary stars.
We'd all love to imagine what it would be like to see Diego Maradona playing with Cristiano Ronaldo or Pele starring alongside Lionel Messi and FIFA gives us the opportunity to simulate just that.
But there's no denying that it gives EA Sports a serious headache to make sure each 'ICON' is given the rating they deserve, hence their cards are staggered across three points of their career.
Otherwise it would be nigh on impossible to compare the likes of Maradona and Pele over the courses of their entire careers with Messi and Ronaldo at a particular point in their's.
Ultimate XI of ICON cards
But in your opinion, who are the best ICON cards on the game? Well, that's a question that Spanish newspaper Marca sought to answer this week by trying to create an ultimate XI from fan votes.
They've selected two legends in each position within a 4-2-3-1 formation and allowed the opinion of the people to decide how exactly this dream starting line-up would look.
The winner in each position is pretty clear at the timing of writing, so you can check out the starting XI in all its glory down below and also the unlucky ICON cards that just missed out.
Goalkeeper: Lev Yashin
Runner-up: Edwin van der Sar
Left-back: Roberto Carlos
Runner-up: Paolo Maldini
Right centre-back: Fabio Cannavaro
Runner-up: Ronald Koeman
Left centre-back: Rio Ferdinand
Runner-up: Marcel Desailly
Right-back: Carlos Alberto
Runner-up: Gianluca Zambrotta
Left centre-midfield: Ruud Gullit
Runner-up: Patrick Vieira
Right centre-midfield: Andrea Pirlo
Runner-up: Clarence Seedorf
Left wing: Ronaldinho
Runner-up: Thierry Henry
Attacking midfield: Zinedine Zidane
Runner-up: Johan Cruyff
Right wing: Diego Maradona
Runner-up: Garrincha
Centre forward: Ronaldo Nazario
Runner-up: Pele
An incredible team of legends
Do you see that team ever losing a match? Us neither.
Especially if you presume that the runners-up in each category are on the bench or in the reserves, it's pretty mental to consider Pele, Cruyff, Henry and Maldini could be coming on as substitutes.
It's fair to say you'd probably be on the end of a 10-0 stuffing even if you lined up all 11 of your players in front of the goal when Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Maradona are sprinting at you.
We can safely assume that would also be the case if somebody managed to assemble this XI on the game itself and there'd be plenty of broken controllers around the world if they did so.
But in the virtual world or an imaginary one, we can all agree that this XI would be the stuff of footballing fantasy. Where's a time machine when you need one?
- FIFA player's thread on improving the game
- Ranking every FIFA from worst to best
- Greatest FIFA songs ranked
