As was the case last year, on the day of the Ballon d’Or ceremony, the CIES Football Observatory took the liberty of compiling a ranking of the 50 most deserving outfield players over the past year, based on three criteria: performances across eight areas of the game according to this methodology (Impect data), the competitive level of the matches played (method) and the results of those matches.

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Editors:
Raffaele Poli
Roger Besson
Loïc Ravenel
Arnaud Bertrand

FC Barcelona’s prodigy Lamine Yamal takes once again the top spot. The Spaniard is ahead of Bayern Munich’s Frenchman Michael Olise and his English teammate Harry Kane. In fourth place, Argentina’s Lionel Messi is the oldest player in the top fifty. He would even have been top had performances not been weighted according to the sporting level of the matches played.

Désiré Doué is fifth, just ahead of Kylian Mbappé and his Paris Saint-Germain teammate Khvicha Kvaratskhelia. Two other FC Barcelona world champions feature in the top 10 (Pedri González and Pau Cubarsí), as does Norway’s Erling Haaland. Last year’s actual winner, France’s Ousmane Dembélé, is, however, only 27th.

>>> Ranking 2025 here