French Ballon d’Or winner backs Barcelona rising superstar for the honour – ‘The best’ | OneFootball

The Ballon d’Or will be decided in less than a month, and Barcelona’s Lamine Yamal appears to be the only direct threat to PSG winger Ousmane Dembele winning the accolade.

While the French superstar indeed won the domestic titles and the UEFA Champions League, Yamal’s magic in his teenage years has been too good to cast aside, and the Barcelona sensation has found many supporting his cause to take home the Ballon d’Or.

With 18 goals and 25 assists in 55 games for Barcelona last season, the teenager made himself one of, if not the most important piece in Hansi Flick’s plans and is only getting better with every passing game. Many, in fact, consider him the best player on the planet already.

French legend makes his pick

Former Ballon d’Or winner Jean-Pierre Papin spoke to the media earlier this week, where he was asked to make his pick for the prestigious award this season.

Despite being a French national, however, he picked Barcelona’s young talent over his compatriot, who is also a frontrunner.

One of the favourites for the Ballon d’Or. (Photo by Alex Caparros/Getty Images)

“Lamine Yamal deserves to win the Golden Ball this year,” he said, as relayed by SPORT.

He was then asked if he was sure of his pick, especially given that he could pick a PSG player like Dembele or Achraf Hakimi, to which he again doubled down on his answer.

“No, for me Yamal was the best and had an exceptional season.”

Yamal has again made a strong start to the new campaign and racked up a goal and an assist in his first performance for Barcelona this season.

Dembele may well be the bookies’ favourite, but last season’s Ballon d’Or race is testament that nothing can be predicted until the very end.

After all, Vinicius Jr. was long hailed as the victor until Rodri surprised everyone by lifting the individual accolade at the Theatre du Chatelet.