Let us first agree that if nothing happens, Ousmane Dembélé will win the Ballon d'Or, as the best player in the world.The Paris Saint-Germain striker scored 21 goals and provided 6 assists in the French Premier League, and led Paris Saint-Germain to win the league title by 19 points over its closest competitor, and also scored 8 goals and provided 6 assists in the Champions League, and led the Parisian club to win the strongest championship in the Old Continent after defeating Inter Milan in the final match 5-0.Moreover, Paris Saint-Germain's transformation into the best team in the world coincided almost directly with Dembele's move to the position of outright striker, and his remarkable brilliance in 2025. So, Dembele has all the statistics, championships and titles that voters are looking for in the award.
Paris Saint-Germain is clearly the best team in the world right now, and we can all see that Dembele is the main reason behind that.But will voters be affected by Paris Saint-Germain's heavy 3-0 defeat to Chelsea in the Club World Cup final, and decide instead to award the prize to Cole Palmer, for example?Jorginho finished third in 2021, Dani Carvajal finished fourth last season, and it's clear to everyone that Palmer is much better than them, so nothing can be ruled out. Despite all this, Dembele is still the most likely candidate.Who else deserves to win the Ballon d'Or?
Who else deserves to win the Ballon d'Or?If we just look at goals and assists in the local league, there is no doubt that there is one player who deserves this award, because he has 13 more goals than any other player, and that is Mohamed Salah.However, there are two problems with looking at things this way. The first problem is that penalty kicks are awarded as if they were the same value as any other goal.It is true that goals scored from penalty kicks add another point to your score, but the player does not put in the same effort as he does when scoring a goal from open play (unless he himself gets the penalty kick).Assists are also counted as equal, so a great through pass that gives a teammate a one-on-one counts like passing the ball to Maradona before he dribbles past the entire England team to score a goal!
For end-of-season awards, penalties should not be ignored, but they should also not count like a goal scored from open play.Instead, the difference between the expected scoring percentage (79 percent) and the goal is resorted to here, so each goal from a penalty kick is equivalent to only 0.21 percent of the goal that comes from open play.As for assists, each pass on the field is evaluated based on the probability of turning it into a goal if the player decides to shoot the ball directly.
Dembele... Salah... Rafinha or Hakimi?
Ultimately, while Paris Saint-Germain winning trophies at the end of the season makes choosing an award winner seem intuitive, there are four players who deserve to win.Your choice will depend on your perspective on the award, and since the criteria are still very vague, there is still plenty of room for interpretation and expectations.The argument in favor of Hakimi is that he is the best player in his position in the world by a large margin over his closest competitor, in addition to the fact that he recently won the historic treble with Paris Saint-Germain.The argument in favor of Rafinha is that he was the most productive player in the world after minor adjustments were made to the way penalty kicks were awarded and opportunities were created.
Moreover, he also performs his defensive duties better than the other strikers mentioned here - he has played a vital role in the effectiveness of Barcelona's high pressure on opponents.The argument in favor of Mohamed Salah is that he contributed to scoring 54 goals, while no other player in the world has reached 50 scoring contributions. Salah also passed the ball and touched it inside the penalty area much more than any other striker.While these numbers drop slightly once penalties are ruled out and opportunities are created, the Premier League is the strongest and most competitive league in the world, as evidenced by the fact that the two teams that finished 15th and 17th in the Premier League table reached the Europa League final, while fourth-placed Chelsea won the Club World Cup.
The argument in Dembele's favor is simply that he is the best striker on the best team in the world. He surpassed Salah when he met the two best teams in the world last March (March).Moreover, Dembele has performed excellently at everything we can expect from a striker in modern football: scoring, creating goals, contributing to building attacks, running without the ball, and pressing.Ultimately, when the differences between players are close, marginal factors such as team success and direct confrontations can serve as a deciding factor.Dembele has stood out in important matches, proving that his numbers in the French Premier League were not just a coincidence, and almost equaling the total numbers of Rafinha and Salah despite participating in much fewer minutes.
