Who deserves the Ballon d’Or? We break down the stats, big-game moments, surprises, and snubs—from Kane and Yamal to Mbappé and Messi. Get ready for bold rankings and plenty to debate! #Football #Soccer #BallonDor #FootballAnalysis
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0:00 - Ballon d'Or Criteria and Candidates
2:17 - Bellingham's Season and World Cup
4:52 - Olize and Dembélé's Rankings
9:01 - Fabián Ruiz, Rodri, and World Cup Weight
11:53 - Season Criteria and Underrated Contenders
14:50 - Messi's World Cup Case
18:15 - Mbappé and Yamal in the Top Three
23:37 - Harry Kane's Case for the Award
We're now available on Spotify! Listen now https://open.spotify.com/show/
Subscribe for more football debates and rankings!
Tell us what you liked most about the video in the comments!
👉 This channel was created in collaboration with https://www.youtube.com/@futebolmaximo
0:00 - Ballon d'Or Criteria and Candidates
2:17 - Bellingham's Season and World Cup
4:52 - Olize and Dembélé's Rankings
9:01 - Fabián Ruiz, Rodri, and World Cup Weight
11:53 - Season Criteria and Underrated Contenders
14:50 - Messi's World Cup Case
18:15 - Mbappé and Yamal in the Top Three
23:37 - Harry Kane's Case for the Award
We're now available on Spotify! Listen now https://open.spotify.com/show/
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SportsTranscript
00:00The race for the Ballon d'Or is back to its glory days and now time is ticking until the
00:05awards
00:05ceremony. Being amazing on the field is obviously what matters most, but the story each candidate
00:11tells carries a lot of weight and we know this award doesn't just measure individual quality.
00:16Mbappé and Yabal have been holding press conferences worthy of a presidential election,
00:20each defending their side in a way we've never seen, not even in the Messi and Cristiano era.
00:26But in the middle of these campaigns, there are some quieter names, people who don't like the
00:30spotlight and players who shine game after game who still haven't received the recognition they
00:35deserve. While everyone else is giving interviews to promote themselves, there are people flying under
00:40the radar of the general public. The odds are on the table and each has a relevant story to tell.
00:46Shall we get to know each candidate? Come with me. To start things off, it's important for us to
00:50establish some criteria for this award. And these aren't criteria that I defined, but the ones that
00:55the Ballon d'Or itself makes public, and it's important for us to take that into consideration.
01:00First, some people chosen by the award will select a list of 30 names and from there,
01:05journalists from the top 100 FIFA-ranked countries will rank these players in order.
01:12And then each position adds up points, and at the end, from this list of 30, we'll have the order
01:17chosen by the journalists. And to choose this, there are basically three criteria. The first is
01:22individual performance and how decisive and impressive that performance is. In other words,
01:27what was that player able to achieve? What did he do throughout the season on his own? How can he
01:32change the course of a match or a season and rack up individual stats? The second is collective
01:37performance and titles. We know, for example, that some positions won't be as relevant in terms of stats
01:43like defensive midfielders, who won't rack up a lot of assists or goals, or at least not those more
01:49well-known metrics. So collective performance does need to be recognized. And finally, class and fair
01:55play, which we know is a bit more controversial and extremely subjective. And we know what happened
02:00when it was a Brazilian against a European at the end of the competition. But in this video,
02:06my goal is to tell the story of each candidate going in order of their chances of winning the award.
02:11And the first one is Jude Bellingham.
02:17I admit that I even understand this guy being 10th on the list in terms of the probability of winning
02:21the award.
02:22But to be honest, I don't think Bellingham's season was all that great. When we talk mainly about individual awards,
02:29we have to understand that the player needs to have had a big individual impact during the season.
02:35And in a season where Real Madrid didn't do so well, and considering Bellingham is an extremely team-oriented
02:40player, meaning he won't just turn things around and win games on his own, maybe it wasn't the best
02:44season for him. And then, when we look at the bigger picture, like the World Cup, maybe that was the
02:50reason he was ahead of a lot of people. Let's take a look at the numbers from last season.
02:56In the Spanish League, he started in 22 matches. And this really caught my attention. Several names on
03:03this list didn't have as many minutes played in their national leagues, which particularly shows that
03:08their regular performance hasn't necessarily been taken into account that much, which to me is
03:13absurd. A player doesn't need to be important only in decisive moments. He also needs to be consistent
03:19throughout the entire season. After all, otherwise we'd end up seeing Ferran Torres standing out just
03:23because of a goal in the World Cup final. As much as I like numbers, I don't think we can
03:27analyze the
03:28season exclusively based on numbers. And Bellingham's case is a bit like that, right? It was six goals and
03:34four assists in La Liga, two goals and one assist in the Champions League. But what bothers me the
03:38most is that he also wasn't really tested in high stakes matches in the later stages of the
03:44competition. Real Madrid didn't fight for the La Liga title, and they also didn't fight for the
03:48Champions League title, where he maybe made the biggest difference was in the World Cup. In eight
03:52games, he started in seven, scored seven goals and had one assist. And most importantly, he managed to
03:57step up at the right moment in the competition. If we look at England's group stage matches,
04:01okay? He scores a goal against Croatia, doesn't contribute against Uganda. That was a scoreless
04:06draw. And he gives an assist in the final minutes against Potama and helps England stand out and
04:11secure qualification. Against Congo, he doesn't take part in any goals. But then, yes, after that,
04:17he really breaks out. Against Mexico, he scores two goals in an extremely decisive match. Against
04:22Norway, the two goals that guarantee England's qualification for the semifinals. And then later against
04:27Argentina, it's a bit disappointing. Even though he made some noteworthy contributions
04:31in the game. But England's match as a whole was disappointing. And then in that crazy game,
04:36that 6-4 game between England and France, England's victory in the third place playoff,
04:40which we know doesn't count for much, he ended up scoring a goal as well.
04:44Tenth place for Bellingham is pretty good, but I think some interesting players were left out of
04:48this list. For ninth place, I have to admit I was a bit disappointed here, you know? I think Olis
04:56was
04:57one of the great players who could really compete for the Ballon d'Or. Even though he's only 24 years
05:01old, he was a guy who had significant playing time during the season. Let's even pull up his numbers
05:06here on 3x5. We can see that last season he started 23 games out of 32 appearances in the
05:11Bundesliga. But in the Champions League, his participation was very significant. He started
05:16in 12 out of the 13 games he played, where he still managed to contribute to 11 goals. What stands
05:22out
05:22the most to me about Olis' season is that it was a high-level season in major competitions.
05:28In the Champions League, he reached the semifinals and everyone will remember that epic game between
05:32Bayern Munich and PSG. It was decided between them and it was probably a final before the final,
05:37right? We knew that the big favorites were there and the match Olisi played was top-notch.
05:42Besides that, he also had good individual stats. He also broke Messi's record for most assists in a
05:48single season. He made 34 assists in the season compared to Messi's 31 a few seasons ago. And
05:55besides that, he broke Pele's record for most assists in a single World Cup. Olis had 7 compared
06:01to Pele's 6 since the numbers started being recorded. In other words, it's not a season to
06:06be ignored. Collectively, he did very well even though he only ended up with the Bundesliga.
06:10But we have to recognize that Bayern was one of the favorites to win the Champions League
06:14and just didn't make it. The final. Because they faced the other favorites earlier in the
06:18semifinals. And maybe even until the elimination against Spain, France was the big favorite for the
06:24World Cup. Because of great collective and individual performances by the players as well.
06:28Olis, I see that maybe he, unlike Bellingham, didn't step up in the big moment of the World Cup.
06:33He had a very good group stage. And from the moment things got tougher and France maybe needed more
06:39individual brilliance, he disappointed a little. But still, in the World Cup he had 7 assists
06:45in 8 games as a starter out of the 8 total games he ended up playing during the World Cup.
06:50To be very
06:51honest, Olisi for me would be at least top 5. Him in 9th place according to the odds, for me,
06:57wasn't
06:57really fair. Just like I also don't think it's fair at all for you to have made it this far
07:01in the video
07:01and not have left a like or subscribed to the channel. Man, this way I even end up feeling kind
07:06of used by you guys.
07:09I also strongly disagree with the 8th place ranking. Of course, in a list of 10, this guy being in
07:158th is
07:16pretty fair. But my problem is that he ended up ahead of Olisi. Here you'll see that in this Ballon
07:21d'Or
07:21contenders list, several of the players didn't actually have that much playing time this season.
07:26Just so you have an idea, Dembélé had about half the minutes of Vitinha and half the minutes of Olisi,
07:32another one of his competitors. In other words, he didn't have as many minutes compared to other
07:37candidates or even players from his own team. But what I think might have made a difference here is
07:42maybe the numbers. I'm not the biggest fan of using numbers as the main criterion to decide who is the
07:49best player in the world. I think there are several other criteria, especially qualitative ones, like
07:54how much a player can stand out even in situations that aren't necessarily favorable and how much he was
07:59able to make a difference in each game and have an impact on the matches. And obviously, I can't give
08:04that
08:04much weight to collective achievements like that. Even so, of course, Dembélé also had a very good
08:09season. If we look at it, there were only 11 games as a starter in the French League. This is
08:14kind of
08:14disappointing to me. The same number of games as a starter in the Champions League, where he really
08:19shined. He had 10 goal contributions in 11 games as a starter and over the whole season, he finished
08:25with 30 goal contributions in 38 games with 23 as a starter. Impressive numbers. And that's leaving the
08:33World Cup out. I think what might have stood out here was the fact that he won the Champions League
08:37and had four goal contributions. He played in the semi-final against Bayern and even scored a penalty
08:43in the final. Obviously, all of this adds weight. We can't say that goal contributions in the group
08:47stage of the Champions League have the same weight as goal contributions in the later stages. For me,
08:52there's nothing absurd about Dembélé being in this top 10. What bothers me is just a guy with so few
08:57minutes played in the season, you know? In seventh place, according to the odds, we have a controversial
09:04one here. This might be the easy pick for voters. Fabian Ruiz didn't have such a magical season.
09:11He had half the minutes of his PSG teammates. He played around 2,000 minutes, while Vitinho,
09:17for example, had over 4,000 minutes in the season. In other words, he wasn't a guy who took part
09:22in the
09:22whole season. He was out due to injury at some point, but obviously, he stepped up at the right time.
09:26He played an important role in winning the World Cup. And I say he's the easy pick for voters,
09:32because if we look only at team achievements, he's the only player who won every possible title.
09:38He won the French Championship, he won the Champions League with PSG, and he also won the World Cup with
09:43Spain. What gets me here is that he wasn't the main player in any of these cases. And here, I'm
09:48not even
09:48talking about the fact that he's a defensive midfielder, or a midfielder, not being the guy
09:53with such impressive stats. I agree that Rodri, for example, deserves to compete to some extent,
09:58especially for being the best player in the World Cup. But Fabian Ruiz, I would say he wasn't even in
10:03the top five for Spain in the World Cup, even though, yes, he had a good run and was important
10:07for the
10:07title. But putting him ahead of Oliz and Dembele is tough for me, you know?
10:14In sixth place, we have Rodri. And for me, we're getting into a point where the Ballon d'Or rankings
10:20start to get a bit tricky. I see that the Ballon d'Or is divided into two main aspects, different
10:25from
10:25the criteria I presented at the beginning of the video. I think there's the qualitative factor,
10:29really, which is evaluating the player's performance throughout the season. And then we look at numbers,
10:34we look at his leadership ability, how decisive he is, and his individual and team titles. But there's
10:39also a very big symbolic factor, especially in a World Cup year. I feel that in a World Cup year,
10:45there's a big difference between what the season's criteria are. And then we're talking about a season
10:50of 40 or 50 games compared to a World Cup of eight games. So I know these games are very
10:55important,
10:56but it's hard to compare 40 or 50 games of consistency with eight games in a World Cup.
11:01To be honest, for me, Rodri was flawless in those eight games. Now, the problem is that throughout the
11:06season, he wasn't even considered for the Ballon d'Or. We look at his stats,
11:09here on 365, it really stands out. Look, if we check the Premier League here, he played 21 games,
11:15only 17 as a starter. One goal scored, three yellow cards. If you look at it, Rodri's season
11:19was pretty modest for the club. We have to take into consideration that he suffered a very serious
11:23injury. And every time he tried to come back, he couldn't manage to have the same consistency
11:26and ended up sidelined for even longer because of fitness issues. And that's normal. The problem
11:30is that he really showed up at the World Cup and dominated. He was the great maestro of this
11:35Spain team and was chosen as the best player of the World Cup. Now, putting him so high on the
11:38list,
11:39I'm not sure I like that so much. I'm more of a qualitative guy. There are people who care more
11:43about the symbolic side. Comment below which side you're on. And if you think it's crazy that
11:48Rodri ended up so high on the list, look, there's something important we need to consider here before
11:52we get to the top five. Okay. It's important to say that this Ballon d'Or takes into account last
11:57season
11:58and also takes into account the World Cup. In other words, everything that's being done at
12:02the start of the season can't be taken into consideration. I don't know if everyone will
12:06follow these exact criteria, but it's important for me to clarify this for you. So, for example,
12:12this fantastic start to the season by Rafinha. And even the more complex stats that I bring here
12:19in our app, they're not taken into consideration. That's 12 goals in seven games in La Liga,
12:26plus three assists and 14 key passes. If we sort here by key passes, few players have had more key
12:31passes than him this season. Arda Guller, Yamal, Inigo Vicente, Jude Bellingham, Nye Lopez,
12:37Edu Esposito, Molero, and then we get to Rafinha, who also scored 12 goals. And obviously, he's way
12:43ahead compared to other players here. If you want to see other numbers like these and even more complex
12:47stats, we can click here, for example, on Rafinha and check it out. Percentage of accurate passes,
12:53key passes, expected assists, expected goal involvements, and of course, goals and assists.
13:00Go to the link in the description and check out our app. There's a lot of cool stuff there.
13:05Now, getting into the top five for me, this is where one of the most underrated players in this
13:10award comes in. And honestly, I wouldn't find it absurd at all, right?
13:15Maybe if we weren't talking about a World Cup year, Kevara would be taken more seriously.
13:20But, unfortunately, he was born in Georgia and didn't have the chance to play in the World Cup.
13:25I could say the same about Haaland too, right? Who had another brilliant season. Maybe it wasn't his
13:29most brilliant season, but it was another season with a lot of goals. And he still managed to stand
13:33out in the World Cup, even playing for Norway. And I admit that I missed seeing him on this list
13:38here.
13:38Because, comparing season by season, I thought Haaland's season was better than Jude Bellingham's at
13:44club level. And in the World Cup, considering the technical level of the Norwegian national team.
13:48For me, his World Cup was better than Bellingham's. But, spoiler alert, the Norwegian didn't show up
13:53here. Let's talk about the guy who deserves the spotlight and maybe fifth place is too low for
13:58him. This guy, yes, for me, had extremely impressive numbers. First, he was a guy with
14:02significant playing time throughout the season. He played a lot in the French League, more than
14:07Fabian Reyes and more than Dembélé. And for me, he was the best player in the Champions League
14:12of the team that won the Champions League. He had 16 goal involvements in the Champions League.
14:16He was the third highest score behind only Mbappe and Harry Kane. And the leader in assists in the
14:21competition. Besides that, he had a double-double throughout the season. 19 goals scored and 10
14:26assists. That's not something just any player can do. Not to mention what the numbers don't show,
14:31right? What he does on the field. He's the guy who makes the difference in tough games. For me,
14:35he was one of the best players in that Champions League semifinal against Bayern Munich in both
14:39matches. And he's the guy who decides important games. He doesn't hide and rarely has a bad game.
14:44For me, his ranking was unfair. It was too low for him.
14:50And then, the fourth place, according to the odds, is what discourages me the most. It doesn't mean
14:55that this will actually be considered or that it will be the final placement in the award. But we need
15:00to understand that these odds usually come pretty close to being right. Messi in fourth place, for me,
15:04is the big distortion in a World Cup year. They basically disregard almost everything that
15:10happened throughout the season just to give the title or at least rank very well the players who
15:14managed to shine in those eight games. If they even played eight games. In Messi's case, he started
15:19in seven. He wasn't a starter in a group stage match. And even when he came on, he ended up
15:23scoring
15:23a goal. And honestly, his numbers for the season are really very good. There are 27 games as a starter.
15:29And here, 25 plus 13, we're talking about 38 goal involvements in 27 games as a starter.
15:37That's extremely significant. The problem is, when we look at the level of difficulty,
15:40a player who's at the end of his career and went to play soccer in the United States to rack
15:45up these
15:45numbers where it's easier to inflate stats. And we'll see players, for example, at the level of
15:49the Brazilian League. They also managed to have pretty inflated numbers over there. I think we
15:53basically have to disregard everything that happened throughout the season. So I can't just take eight
15:58games in the season, including the World Cup out of 60 games to put this guy in the top four,
16:03especially when I see that he was ahead of Kvara and ahead of Ulysses. Ulysses for me is the most
16:07unfairly treated guy in this whole list of probabilities. So look now, obviously in the World
16:13Cup, he was one of the guys who made the biggest difference. And maybe he and Rodri were the best
16:18players of the tournament. For me, he was the best player of the World Cup. Okay, I think because of
16:22how much he could change a game. I think that's where it even gets a bit unfair when we compare
16:26attacking players with defensive midfielders. The defensive midfielder, no matter how important
16:31he is to make the game happen, it's rare for him to make the difference in the decisive moments of
16:35the match. He's more important collectively than individually. And Messi's numbers here speak for
16:39themselves, right? He was involved in 12 goals. And at one point in the World Cup, he was the top
16:45scorer in the history of the tournament with 21 goals. And if we look at his matches in the World
16:50Cup,
16:50obviously this really stands out, right? Let's go back here first to the group stage. In the debut
16:55against Algeria, he starts off with a hat trick. Then two goals against Austria, a goal against
17:01Jordan, a goal and a great performance against Cape Verde, a goal and an assist against Egypt in
17:07an epic comeback, an assist against Switzerland in an epic comeback, two assists against England
17:12in an epic comeback. And then yes, a World Cup final, disappointing. So out of eight games,
17:16there were seven very good games. Maybe we can just slightly disregard the game against Jordan
17:20since he only played 31 minutes, but he still came in and scored his goal. In other words,
17:25Messi deserves to be remembered for the Ballon d'Or. He does. But for me, the top five is too
17:29strong for
17:30him. Maybe top 10 or maybe put Messi among the top 30 or just leave Messi aside and give him
17:37a
17:37symbolic mention. Symbolically, he was a very important player. And I don't know, from now on,
17:42he's kind of retired from the Ballon d'Or because his performances in MLS won't carry as much weight.
17:46I know it's hard to set these criteria, but maybe give some other little award, right?
17:51Recognition for their careers, give an award to Messi, to Christian for everything they've done
17:55for football and so on. Now, taking into consideration both the World Cup and now that
18:00he's retired from the national team, wouldn't this be the time to just go with the symbolism?
18:04Now, we also have to understand that these here are just probabilities. I hope that in the awards,
18:08he doesn't end up in the top four, please. Now, before we get into the top three, I think you
18:13can
18:13already guess more or less who the three players will be. I think it's important to
18:16say that here we have players with very different profiles. And how interesting it is to see this
18:21award becoming so competitive again, with prominent players with different profiles.
18:26I felt that last season with the award going to Dembélé, and here I'm not going to say whether
18:30it was fair or unfair, we ended up awarding a bit more based on collective criteria. Individually,
18:35he was very good. Obviously, he won many titles, which is relevant. But for me, he wasn't a player
18:40people discussed as a Ballon d'Or contender throughout the season. It turned out that he was a player who
18:45won
18:45it after the Champions League title, and then people start looking at the numbers. They look
18:49at the Champions League title and give the award to Dembélé. These three guys are the ones who fight
18:53for this award, year after year. And for me, any of them, they have to finish their careers with at
18:59least one Ballon d'Or. Some are already at a more advanced stage of their careers. Others are just
19:04getting started. So let's start this top three with Kylian Mbappé.
19:11Out of everyone on this list, Mbappé was the first player to surpass 40 goal involvements in a
19:17single season. And this is where I say we have to recognize individual performance regardless of
19:22the team's performance. We know that Real Madrid's season was disappointing. They went the whole season
19:27without winning anything, even disappointing at several important moments. But if it was a
19:31disappointment, collectively, individually, for Mbappé, it definitely wasn't. Another top scoring
19:36season that he finished. As the top scorer of La Liga, top scorer of the Champions League, top scorer
19:42of the World Cup, and the highest scorer in the history of the World Cups with 22 goals scored and
19:47with more World Cups ahead of him, this for me qualifies him as one of the top three players
19:52genuinely in contention for the world's best player award. And besides more than 40 goal involvements
19:57when we look deeper into the numbers, it's actually scary. For his club, there were 48 goal
20:02involvements in 44 matches. That alone draws a lot of attention. If we include the World Cup in the
20:09equation, where he scored eight goals and provided four assists, we're talking about a season with 62
20:16goal involvements in 58 matches. For me, he combines everything I expect from a Ballon d'Or candidate.
20:24He was the guy who played a lot of minutes. He was decisive when he needed to be, even though
20:30he
20:30didn't manage to go that far in the competitions. And maybe that could be a small tiebreaker. He had
20:36incredible individual numbers. He broke historic records and deserves to be here. Maybe when we
20:43compare him to other players who are ahead of him, maybe it's exactly because he didn't make the
20:47difference. The club as a whole didn't go that far, just like France in the World Cup, that weighed a
20:51little more against him. Despite that, we have to acknowledge that France, while they were in the
20:56World Cup, were the big favorites to win the title. Does that carry some weight? Obviously. When they
21:00faced Spain, they ended up losing and that has to be taken into account as well.
21:08In second place is Yamal. And here you can already see the chances of winning jump sharply. Mbappé was
21:13around a 5% chance of winning the Ballon d'Or. Yamal is already up to about 38%.
21:20Tied. I can already tell you. With the guy who's in first place here on our list. Tied with Yamal.
21:25Yamal had 41 goal involvements this season for his club, which for me is extremely significant when
21:31we're not talking about a center forward. And for me, he's the guy who maybe best represents the
21:35subjective factor. That goes beyond the numbers in the Ballon d'Or award. Mbappé might be the guy who
21:40leads in the objective criteria, right? He didn't win titles, but he had impressive numbers, broke
21:45records, and was the top scorer. Yamal stands out on the subjective side. Every game Yamal plays is
21:50magical. When you see Yamal on the field, he's brilliant. And he's the guy that we feel maybe
21:55deserved to win the Ballon d'Or since last season. He's the guy who can't finish his career without a
21:59Ballon d'Or, just like we saw that with Neymar at certain moments. Yamal is the guy who represents the
22:04magical side of soccer. And if soccer at its core is entertainment, Yamal is the guy who knows best
22:11how to deliver that on the field. He's the guy who plays with flair, who makes the difference,
22:15who decides games, and obviously brings magic onto the field. And then, when we look at the
22:19objective criteria, he also has incredible numbers. Let's take a look at last season's numbers.
22:24He had a significant amount of minutes in La Liga and also in the Champions League. There were 10 goal
22:30involvements in 10 Champions League matches. There were 27 goal involvements with double figures in
22:35both goals and assists in La Liga in 26 games as a starter, and he finished the season with
22:40incredible numbers. And then, what maybe weighs most in favor of Yamal being better positioned than
22:45Mbappé, for me, is that this subjective criterion counts more than the objective ones. It's precisely
22:51that Barca's season was more magical. And the kid obviously is still very young. Let's even check his
22:55exact age at 19 years old, already being a World Cup champion. Something that Mbappé also managed
23:01to do, I think, at 19, maybe 18 years old back in 2018. And Yamal, maybe not in a World
23:07Cup as
23:08brilliant as Mbappé's at that time, ended up only scoring in the rout against Saudi Arabia and had
23:13a World Cup where he didn't shine as much in the moments we expected. Even so, he managed to deliver
23:18magic in some games, like against Portugal, which for me was Yamal's best match, even though he
23:23finished without scoring in a great game by Diogo Costa. And for me, he deserves this second place,
23:29or at least to fight for titles. If he wins, I will be very happy, and I think it will
23:33be a win
23:33for Attractive Soccer. Good, good. Now, for first place, you already know who it is, you've already
23:40seen it. Harry Kane, also tied there with Yamal, with a 38% chance of winning this award. Harry Kane,
23:46for me, is a guy who built his career through hard work. It's different, for example, from Yamal,
23:51who was a star from the very first moment he appeared at Barcelona, from Mbappé, who has
23:55accumulated records, and has had more than 40 goal involvements for at least 8 seasons since he
24:00arrived at PSG, and then after he joined Real Madrid. He's a guy who stacks up records and
24:05numbers on top of numbers, and I don't doubt he'll fight for a thousand goals by the end of his
24:08career.
24:08But Harry Kane, he's had to fight much harder throughout his career. He didn't stand out since
24:13his youth, he only really broke through when he was already at Tottenham, and then he started racking up
24:18incredible numbers, Premier League top scorer, and later he needed to take another step to be
24:22recognized worldwide. He went to Bayern Munich, won the title he needed in his career with the
24:27Bundesliga, racked up incredible numbers, or at least opened the world's eyes to the incredible
24:32numbers he was already putting up. And now, at the age of 33, he's also revolutionizing the center
24:37forward position. Maybe at some point we used to say that the player's peak happens at 27 or 28 years
24:43old, and today we see that this peak can be extended more and more, and that players keep
24:48reinventing themselves in world football. Kane not only reinvents himself, but also reinvents the
24:53center forward position, and it's not just as a false nine. Harry Kane steps into the box to score
24:58goals, he leaves the box to create goals, to open up space, to deliver assists, and many times he drops
25:03back near the defenders, almost like a defensive midfielder to actually make the game happen.
25:08All of this while putting up incredible numbers throughout the season. Last season,
25:12Kane played 31 Bundesliga matches, starting in 25 of them. He had 41 goal involvements in 25 games
25:20as a starter. That's a guy who broke past 40 goal involvements. But what really catches my attention
25:26is that Mbappé had some outstanding numbers. 62 goal involvements when we include the World Cup.
25:33For Kane, we didn't even need to include the World Cup. He had 67 goal involvements in 43 games as
25:39a
25:39starter, or in 50 games total. This really makes your eyes light up. And when we include the World Cup
25:45in the count, we're talking about 68, or here it will be 74 goal involvements, including six goals scored
25:53and one assist. Maybe unlike Bellingham, he improved more at first. He was very important there at the end
25:59of this stage, of a group stage, and at the start of the knockout stage. Let's even pull up his
26:04matches
26:04here. He scores twice against Croatia. No one scores against Ghana. He scores against Panama in a very
26:09important match. He scores two goals against Congo, and he scores and gives an assist against Mexico.
26:13Then he disappears a bit more against Norway, and he also disappears a bit more against Argentina,
26:17and then he doesn't play in the match against France. Even so, he's neck and neck with Bellingham.
26:23A much better season at club level. No wonder he's the leading contender. And for me,
26:28he was neck and neck with Bellingham at the World Cup. Here, this makes the competition very hard to decide.
26:33But what do we have to take into consideration? For me, Harry Kane, Odis, Yamal, and Mbappé were the players.
26:39And maybe Kvara as well. They were the players in contention for the world's best player award
26:44throughout the whole season. It wasn't the guy who stood out at the end. It wasn't the guy who played
26:48in the World Cup. And he managed to raise his status because of the symbolic factor of those eight games.
26:53For me, Harry Kane was the most magical guy of the season. And it would be totally fair if he
26:58won
26:58the Ballon d'Or. Now, to be honest with you, I'm going to sit on the fence a little. Any
27:02of these
27:03five here who win, for me, it would be totally fair. Now, if I had to cast my vote, I
27:08admit I would
27:09give the award to Harry Kane. It would crown a brilliant career. In other words, there's the
27:13symbolic factor. There's the individual factor. He put up incredible numbers, even if it was in a less
27:18competitive league, an easier league. But he still dominated. And he also had a very interesting
27:23World Cup. Yamal, even though he didn't have such a great World Cup, was magical throughout the season.
27:28And obviously, everyone else on this list deserved recognition. Now, leave a comment below.
27:32Make your own top five so I can see if you're saying something crazy or if I agree with your
27:36opinion.
27:37And now, just click on one of these four videos to keep binge-watching our channel.