Sevilla 2004

Coach: Joaquín Caparrós

Two years before Sevilla's UEFA Cup breakthrough, Joaquín Caparrós's 2003-04 squad was blooding a teenage Sergio Ramos and José Antonio Reyes, both of whom would be sold within the following year for significant fees — Reyes to Arsenal that January in a deal that made him one of the most expensive Spanish players in history at the time, and Ramos to Real Madrid the following summer, where he would go on to become one of the club's greatest-ever defenders and captains. Sevilla finished mid-table in La Liga that season, still some way from the sustained European excellence the club would build under Caparrós's successor Juande Ramos, who led Sevilla to back-to-back UEFA Cup titles in 2006 and 2007. This transitional squad is best understood in hindsight as the foundation of Sevilla's remarkable academy and recruitment pipeline of this era, a scouting and youth-development operation that turned the club into one of the most reliable producers and sellers of elite Spanish talent anywhere in Europe throughout the 2000s, funding the club's later trophy-laden years through the transfer fees generated by players first given their chance in seasons like this one.