Five English players are on the 40-strong shortlist to be crowned as Europe’s best young player.
While Gareth Bale was the only British player to make Fifa’s 23-man shortlist for the Ballon d’Or award this week, the nominations for this year’s prestigious Golden Boy award, which was first established by the Italian newspaper Tuttosport, features Liverpool’s Raheem Sterling, Calum Chambers of Arsenal, Luke Shaw of Manchester United, Everton’s John Stones and Eric Dier of Tottenham.
A whole host of Premier League-based players have also made the shortlist including the Chelsea defender Kurt Zouma, Liverpool winger Lazar Markovic and Manchester United forward Adnan Januzaj.
The award, open to any players aged 21 and under, is voted for by journalists from 30 newspapers around the world and Wayne Rooney remains the only English winner after picking up the prize in 2004. The France and Juventus midfielder Paul Pogba is the holder having finished just ahead of Everton’s Romelu Lukaku last year.
Other previous winners include Lionel Messi (2005), Sergio Agüero (2007) and Mario Götze (2011).
The full shortlist:
Premier League Calum Chambers (Arsenal), Kurt Zouma (Chelsea), John Stones (Everton), Raheem Sterling, Lazar Markovic, Divock Origi (Liverpool), Adnan Januzaj, Luke Shaw (Manchester United), Nabil Bentaleb, Eric Dier (Tottenham).
La Liga Gerard Deulofeu (Sevilla), Aymeric Laporte (Athletic Bilbao), Sandro Ramirez, Munir El Haddai (Barcelona), Saúl Ñíguez (Atlético Madrid).
Serie A Domenico Berardi (Sassuolo), Bernardeschi Franco (Fiorentina), Kingsley Coman (Juventus), Keita Baldé Diao (Lazio), Mateo Kovacic (Inter).
Bundesliga Hakan Calhanoglu (Bayer Leverkusen), Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg, Gianluca Gaudino (Bayern Munich), Matthias Ginter (Borussia Dortmund), Julian Green (Hamburg), Maximilian Meyer (Schalke).
Ligue 1 Marquinhos, Adrien Rabiot (Paris Saint-Germain), Benjamin Mendy (Marseille), Lucas Ocampos (Monaco).
Eredivisie Tonny Vilhena (Feyenoord), Jetro Willems (PSV), Arkadiusz Milik (Ajax).
Jupiler League Dennis Praet, Alexander Mitrovic (Anderlecht).
Others Oliver Torres (Porto), Bruma (Galatasaray), Gonzalez (Basel), Nikola Ninkovic (Partizan Belgrade), Luka Zahovic (Maribor).
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