Josef Bican

Austrian-Czech footballer (1913–2001)

Fame59.9
Momentum15.7
Austria rank#129

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Fame59.9
Momentum15.7
Austria rank#129
Footballers rank#230
Wikipedia30.5K

Lived 1913–2001, aged 88Austria

Austria FootballersFootball / Soccer Player

Wikipedia
43 languages
Cross-language footprint
Rank in Austria
#129
Footballers
Era
1913–2001
Aged 88
Awards
1
recognised work

Summary

Updated 2026-06-21

The arithmetic is staggering: over 950 goals in 624 official matches, 591 of them for Slavia Prague alone. Josef Bican is considered by some the most prolific goalscorer in football history—a striker so lethal that the goals-per-game ratio still doesn't quite add up to belief.

Biography

About

Bican turned professional at Rapid Vienna in 1931 and collected four Austrian league titles before moving to Slavia Prague in 1937, where he stayed eleven years and became the club's all-time top scorer. He played for Austria's Wunderteam at the 1934 World Cup, reaching the semi-finals, then switched to Czechoslovakia—but a clerical error blocked him from the 1938 tournament. Tall, two-footed, fast enough to run 100 metres in 10.8 seconds, he retired in 1955 as the Czechoslovak First League's all-time leading scorer with 447 goals. He coached through the 1970s. In 2000, the IFFHS named him the…

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