Issue number 361 of the CIES Football Observatory Weekly Post presents the best XI for each of the five major European leagues. Players were selected according to the CIES Performance Index powered by Opta data. Only footballers fielded for at least 900 domestic league minutes since the start of the 2021/22 season were included in the line-ups.

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Editors:
Raffaele Poli
Roger Besson
Loïc Ravenel
Thomas Gonzalez

Ten of the eleven players in the English Premier League best XI are from Manchester City (Dias, Laporte, Cancelo, Rodri, Silva) and Liverpool FC (Alexander-Arnold, Henderson, Salah, Jota, Mané), the only exception being Chelsea FC’s goalkepeer Edouard Mendy. In Spain, we find six Real Madrid players (Courtois, Alaba, Casemiro, Modrić, Benzema and Vinícius), three from Sevilla (Koundé, Acuña and Jordán), and one from both Barcelona (Dest) and Betis (Fekir).

Only three clubs are represented in the German Bundesliga best XI: Bayern (7 players), Borussia Dortmund (3) and Bayer Leverkusen (Patrik Schick). Conversely, the French Ligue 1 best XI includes players from a record number of six clubs: Paris St-Germain (4 players), Olympique de Marseille (3), as well as Montpellier, Lens, Rennes and Brest. Finally, in Italy, Inter is the most represented club (4 players), ahead of Milan (3), Napoli (3) and Sassuolo (Domenico Berardi).