17-year-old Barcelona star is the favorite to win the next Golden Boy award | OneFootball

With his performances for Barcelona and the Spanish national team in the last year or so, Lamine Yamal has clearly proven that he belongs in the most elite category of players in Europe, only at the age of 17 years.

After his breakout 2023-24 season, the Spaniard has continued to display his good form at the start of this 2024-25 season. In fact, with his performances up to now, this season is looking likely to be even better than the last one for the La Masia graduate.

The star forward already broke almost every youth-related record last season, and it now looks like individual awards are also in line for him.

This is particularly clear from a report from Diario AS, which claims that Lamine Yamal is the favorite to win the Golden Boy award this year, thus taking the honor of being the best young player in Europe from Real Madrid’s Jude Bellingham.

Although he is the youngest in the 25-player list published by Tuttosport, the organizers of this award, Lamine leads the ranking published by Football Benchmark, which takes into account the performances of players with both their club and national teams.

In this ranking, the Barcelona star is followed by the Paris Saint Germain midfielder Joao Neves, and the podium is completed by the Manchester United forward Alejandro Garnacho.

France is the most well-represented country in this list with 11 entries, while La Liga and Bundesliga are the best-represented leagues with 10 entries each. The winner will be selected through a combination of voting done by an international jury and the fans.

Thus, by winning this prestigious prize, Yamal will follow in the footsteps of some of the best players to have played in Europe, including Lionel Messi. Some recent stars like Jude Bellingham, Erling Haaland, and Kylian Mbappe have also won this prize in the past.