Ousmane Dembélé crowned world's best player after long journey from Rennes wonderkid to PSG main man
Ousmane Dembélé has been voted the best male player in the world by the Guardian's 219-strong voting panel, completing a remarkable journey from unheralded Rennes youth prospect to the driving force behind Paris Saint-Germain's historic 2025.
The defining image of PSG's 5-0 win over Inter in the 2025 Champions League final was not the trophy lift, or any one of the goal celebrations, but Dembélé, poised on the edge of the opposition penalty area with hunched demeanour and furrowed brow, his face a picture of focus, ready to press. It was a snapshot of a player who has quietly become the main man after a career that has been anything but linear.
The one who stood out at 17
Eleven years ago, Dembélé appeared in the Guardian's inaugural Next Generation feature as a France-based talent born in 1997, then a youth player yet to make a first-team appearance at Rennes. A shortlist of five was narrowed down not by asking questions about the players' football ability, but about other attributes: resilience, adaptability, decision-making, creativity, work ethic, response to feedback and willingness to learn — the qualities we cannot see, and which are harder to measure. Based on those answers, one player stood out above all the others: a kid called Ousmane Dembélé.
Tuchel's "curious-motivated" category
Dembélé started off like a train, winning France's young player of the year award in his first season as a professional before helping Borussia Dortmund win the German Cup the following season. It was during that spell that Thomas Tuchel, his coach at Dortmund, offered a telling insight into what made him tick, saying Dembélé's talent came with "an obligation and responsibility to improve".
Tuchel bracketed his players into one of three "ABC" categories depending on their dominant motivation. A stood for "aggressive-motivated" — players driven by individual glory and awards (in his eyes not necessarily a negative: think Neymar at Paris). B stood for "binding-motivated", those who love being part of the group and bringing people together, often captains such as César Azpilicueta at Chelsea. The C category — "curious-motivated" — was reserved for the players capable of greatness, who needed to be trained in a slightly different way. Their talent could take them far, and on a good day they were capable of anything. Tuchel loved coaching these players, and Dembélé, he felt, was a C.
The Barcelona years that never were
Then came the sliding doors moment. In 2017, Dembélé moved to Barcelona, who were flush with money from selling Neymar for €222m (£194m). That same summer the club changed coach: in came Ernesto Valverde, out went Luis Enrique.
What followed were six injury-laden years in which Dembélé started only a third of Barcelona's league games and scored a total of 24 league goals. His most memorable moment may have been an infamous one: the last-minute one-on-one he missed against Liverpool in the 2019 Champions League semi-final, with Barcelona already 3-0 up — before they famously lost the second leg 4-0. When he did leave, amid mutterings of wasted talent and blackmail, it felt like a relief for all parties.
The 2025 renaissance
There is some symmetry to Dembélé's exceptional 2025. Of the 30 goals he has scored this calendar year, the most decisive and emblematic was probably against Liverpool in the second leg of their Champions League last-16 tie. With PSG 1-0 down from the first leg, Dembélé drifted into his own half, losing his markers who did not want to follow him that far. He picked up the ball, spread it wide to the right-winger Bradley Barcola, then sprinted into the box to meet the cross and score. He also converted a penalty in PSG's successful shootout after their 1-0 win at Anfield that night.
He did something similar against Arsenal in the semi-final, dropping deep early in the game, switching the play to the left-sided Khvicha Kvaratskhelia and receiving the return ball, unmarked, on the edge of the area before scoring. Even when teams knew it was coming, they could not stop him.
Liberated by Luis Enrique's plan
The transformation has its roots in a deliberate design. At the start of last season, Luis Enrique's plan was for the whole team to replace the goals of Kylian Mbappé, who had joined Real Madrid. Dembélé, after all, had not scored more than 10 league goals in a season since his debut campaign at Rennes. The coach wanted the team to be the star — and so, with no star player to serve, Dembélé was liberated.
The curious-motivated talent who once scored penalties with either foot, and even took corners with either foot, quietly became the main man. He starts the press; his vision, movement, pace, control and positioning set the tone; and his finishing, once considered wasteful, is now ruthless.
Closer to an answer
What makes a good player great, and a great player the best? Part of the equation remains what cannot be seen: the chemistry within a team, the relationship with a specific coach, playing in a system that brings out the best in every player. But also those other qualities Dembélé had at 17, and still has now. This well-deserved prize is as much for those attributes as it is for his goals and the trophies he helped Paris Saint-Germain win.