{"id":3239,"date":"2026-09-14T10:00:31","date_gmt":"2026-09-14T10:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/?p=3239"},"modified":"2026-09-14T10:00:31","modified_gmt":"2026-09-14T10:00:31","slug":"lamine-yamal-names-his-only-ballon-dor-rival-and-its-not-harry-kane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/?p=3239","title":{"rendered":"Lamine Yamal names his only Ballon d\u2019Or rival \u2013 and it\u2019s not Harry Kane"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>France striker Mbappe, who finished as top scorer in the World Cup, La Liga, and the Champions League, stated last week that no player was better than him last season despite failing to claim any silverware.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>Yamal was voted La Liga\u2019s standout player in 2025-26 as Barcelona successfully retained the title, before proving pivotal in Spain\u2019s World Cup victory across North America.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>&#8220;I honestly believe there are two of us who are the best in the world, and this year I\u2019d deserve it because of what I\u2019ve won,&#8221; Yamal said in an interview clip released by <em>Movistar<\/em> on Sunday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>Yamal has named Mbappe as his only rival for the Ballon d&#8217;Or (Getty)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>&#8220;As far as I\u2019m concerned, Mbappe and I are the two best in the world. It\u2019s clear to me and everyone who watches the matches knows it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>Yamal was runner-up behind PSG and France forward Ousmane Dembele last year, while Mbappe came third in 2023 when Lionel Messi won the honour for a record eighth time.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>The 30-player shortlist for this year\u2019s award was released last week, with Yamal, Mbappe and Dembele all making the cut.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>However, England captain <a href=\"https:\/\/onefootball.com\/en\/player\/harry-kane-3148\">Harry Kane<\/a> is considered by many to be the favourite for the Ballon d\u2019Or this time around after scoring a staggering 73 goals for club and country last season.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>Harry Kane is considered by many to be the favourite for the Ballon d&#8217;Or (Reuters)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>Kane won the Bundesliga and German Cup with <a href=\"https:\/\/onefootball.com\/en\/team\/bayern-munich-6\">Bayern Munich<\/a>, but was knocked out in the semi-finals of the Champions League by Dembele\u2019s PSG.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>He also fell short of leading England to World Cup glory as the Three Lions were beaten 2-1 by Argentina in the semi-finals, although they did regroup to beat France 6-4 in the third place play-off.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>Speaking last week to <em>TNT Sports<\/em> about his Ballon d\u2019Or hopes, Kane said: &#8220;Of course, now it is out of my hands, it is down to the voters and the people who decide it. The season I had was my best season by far and we\u2019ll have to wait and see.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>The Ballon d&#8217;Or ceremony takes place in London on 26 October.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/onefootball.com\/en\/news\/lamine-yamal-names-his-only-ballon-dor-rival-and-its-not-harry-kane-43456852\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>France striker Mbappe, who finished as top scorer in the World Cup, La Liga, and&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3240,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/2Fv22Fphotobooth2Fcms2Fen2F434568523Fdate2026-09-14.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3239"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3239\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportbulletin.top\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}