Ranking the 10 best currently active trophyless players: Pickford, Watkins… | OneFootball

Many footballers are reduced to the medals in their cabinet, yet raw brilliance alone is no guarantee of glory.

Iconic, era-defining players, including Matt Le Tissier, Antonio Di Natale and Giuseppe Signori, spent their whole careers without lifting any trophies. And there are plenty of modern-day equivalents.

We’ve ranked the 10 best players who haven’t won a single piece of silverware… yet.

Note: We haven’t included trophyless footballers aged 23 or under – including Morgan Rogers, Murillo, Riccardo Calafiori and Rayan Cherki, to name a few – because they’re all relatively early in their careers and have time on their side. 

10. Allan Saint-Maximin

Alright, Saint-Maximin spent his peak years dazzling us at famously trophy-starved Newcastle United.

No surprises there. He did start for Eddie Howe’s Magpies in the 2023 League Cup final defeat to Manchester United, and he left the club by the time they finally got their hands on the prize two years later.

Either side of his spell on Tyneside, Saint-Maximin has had something of a journeyman career representing decent-sized clubs around the world.

Monaco, Nice and Saint-Etienne back in France. Latterly Saudi Pro League outfit Al-Ahli, Jose Mourinho’s Fenerbahce in Turkey and Club America out in Mexico.

You’d have thought he’d have at least one shiny pot from all those stints, but apparently not. His entire honours list comprises of one North East FWA Player of the Year award and a Premier League Goal of the Month prize.

Still, at the age of 28, he has plenty of time to get his hands on something.

He signed for Lens in January, and the upstarts are just four points behind PSG in the Ligue 1 title race and one of the best remaining sides in the Coupe de France. Watch this space.

9. Anton Stach

The 27-year-old Germany international has been a revelation in Leeds United’s midfield this season. The ability to score spectacular free-kicks is just the cherry on top of his all-round game.

Stach didn’t represent any of his home nation’s glamour clubs (Greuther Furth, Mainz, Hoffenheim), which explains his blank honours list prior to arriving in Yorkshire.

He did at least achieve promotion to the Bundesliga with Greuther Furth, but only as the runners-up – and you don’t get a trophy for that.

Honourable mention for fellow Leeds summer signing Gabriel Gudmundsson. The left-back spent four years at Lille, having joined the club when they were reigning Ligue 1 champions.

Daniel Farke’s side remain in the FA Cup. Never say never.

8. Mikkel Damsgaard

The Danish playmaker, who first announced himself with a series of excellent performances at Euro 2020, has spent the past four years at Brentford. And he didn’t win anything at boyhood club Nordsjaelland or Sampdoria either.

But Thomas Frank’s Bees have been something of a surprise package this season and might just back themselves to be this season’s Crystal Palace in the FA Cup.

Still only 25, you wonder if Damsgaard might eventually end up at a club in a more viable position to really compete for silverware.

7. Douglas Luiz

It was just a couple of years back that Luiz was considered among the best midfielders in the Premier League.

He’s lost his lustre a bit since a move to Juventus didn’t work out, now back on loan at Aston Villa and aiming to rekindle his career.

Luiz has won Olympic Gold and the Toulon Tournament (where he was named the tournament’s best player) at Under-23 level, but nothing in senior football.

There have been a couple of near-misses. He started Villa’s 2020 League Cup final defeat to Manchester City and was part of the Brazil squad that reached (but lost) the Copa America final 12 months later.

6. Gregor Kobel

Including this season, it will be an unthinkable five years since Germany’s second biggest club lifted silverware – when the likes of Jude Bellingham, Erling Haaland and Jadon Sancho featured in their stylish 4-1 DFB Pokal victory over RB Leipzig.

They’ve got close to glory in that time, absolutely bottling the Bundesliga title on the final day of the 2022-23 campaign and giving Real Madrid a proper contest in the Champions League final the following year.

Last season, Serhou Guirassy scored 38 goals in all competitions and there are green shoots of encouragement under Niko Kovac.

Among the standout players of this drought period is Swiss international Kobel, who joined the club from Stuttgart in 2021. The two-time Bundesliga keeper of the year is still yet to lift a trophy.

5. Matheus Cunha

The enigmatic Brazilian forward has won zilch with Sion, RB Leipzig, Hertha Berlin, Atletico Madrid or Wolves prior to this summer’s big-money move to Old Trafford.

Save for something spectacular in the Premier League, Cunha won’t be winning anything this season either.

But he appears a shoo-in for Carlo Ancelotti’s Brazil squad. Maybe he’ll join the one-and-done World Cup club.

4. Antoine Semenyo

Put a big asterisk next to this one and call him your placeholder. Every chance we’re quietly deleting Semenyo’s name from this list come May.

The quadruple is probably beyond Manchester City, particularly with worthy adversaries in Arsenal on all four fronts.

But we’d be amazed if they don’t win something this season. A second successive trophyless season is unthinkable for a coach of Pep Guardiola’s calibre.

Semenyo is now at an elite club where silverware comes relatively freely. But boy, has he worked hard to get there, from Bristol City to Bournemouth (via loans at Bath City, Newport County and Sunderland).

3. Nico Schlotterbeck

Alongside his Dortmund team-mate Kobel, the only other player in this top 10 to make it to the zenith of the club game and start in a Champions League final.

We’d be amazed if Schlotterbeck doesn’t win something soon. But it might not be with Borussia Dortmund; Real Madrid are said to be among the 26-year-old centre-back’s suitors.

2. Ollie Watkins

For years, Harry Kane was the poster boy when it came to this topic. After the England captain won a standard-issue Bundesliga title with Bayern, it’s only fitting that his understudy takes his place.

Aston Villa’s all-time top goalscorer in the Premier League, Watkins has done alright for himself since starting out in relative obscurity at League Two Exeter City.

The striker’s on for an 11th successive season for double-figure league goals as he’s risen through the English football pyramid, but fate has conspired to deny him silverware.

At Brentford, Watkins played under Thomas Frank and alongside the likes of Bryan Mbeumo and David Raya.

But he didn’t hang around after they lost their nerve in the 2019-20 promotion chase, and was at Aston Villa by the time they won the play-offs the following year.

Might we be on for an Unai Emery special with the Europa League this year?

1. Jordan Pickford

England’s long-serving No.1 can join Cunha and Luiz in proudly pointing to his Toulon Tournament trophy.

Sorry pal, we’re counting trinkets from the lower leagues and even the Community Shield – but senior silverware only. FA Youth Cups and the like are for the kids.

It’ll be wild if Pickford, arguably the Three Lions’ greatest-ever goalkeeper and a modern-day Premier League icon, hangs up his gloves one day without having actually won anything. But time is ticking.

Given Everton’s long trophy drought, we thought more of the club’s contemporary stalwarts would be eligible for this list.

But Seamus Coleman won the play-offs with Blackpool in 2010, Michael Keane won the Championship with Burnley in 2016 and Dominic Calvert-Lewin won League Two on loan at Northampton the same year.

You learn something new every day, eh?