M. CARMEN TORRES
Updated
Lamine Yamal keeps making history. The young blaugrana winger was honored today with theKopa Trophy2026, the annual award presented by the French magazine France Football to recognize the best footballer in the world under 21 years of age. The Catalan international is receiving this award... for the third consecutive year!
Barcelona reigns again in the Kopa Trophy and Lamine Yamal continues to associate his name with this recognition. The winger is credited, once again, with this distinction, whose jury is made up exclusively of Ballon d'Or winners and which has been awarded since 2018 (it was canceled in 2020 because of the pandemic). It is the eighth edition of the award from France Football magazine, and the La Masia graduate won it for the third consecutive time: he already collected it in 2024 and 2025. The first was won by Mbappé, when he was still playing for PSG; in 2019, De Ligt (Ajax); in 2021, Pedri (Barcelona); in 2022, Gavi (Barcelona); and in 2023, Bellingham (Real Madrid).
Lamine adds a new Kopa Trophy to his honors list, which keeps growing and is overwhelming despite him being only 19 years old. The international winger won LaLiga and the Spanish Super Cup with Barcelona in 2026 and the World Cup with the Spanish national team.
The protagonist, true to his style, wanted to share the recognition with a teammate. “I wish Cubarsí, my teammate, were here. This award should have been for him. I wish he had won it”, said Lamine Yamal in reference to the young Barça center-back, who was also a candidate for the award.
The winger also took the opportunity to thank his two teams for their support and to set himself new goals. “To thank my club and my national team. I have to keep working to win collective and individual titles like this one”, said the footballer from Rocafonda, who insisted on the same idea when asked whether it was the award he had expected to receive tonight: “I would have liked this one to be for Cubarsí”.
Barça and national team
The forward from Rocafonda is a regular in the Blaugrana side (in the 25-26 season he featured in 45 matches, in which he scored 24 goals and provided 18 assists, and this campaign he already has 13 appearances, ten goals and ten final passes), and he is also an undisputed starter for Luis de la Fuente's national team. With Spain, despite his youth, he has taken part in 37 matches, in which he netted 11 goals. At the World Cup this past summer, he was decisive: he played in all eight matches, starting seven of them.
Now, Lamine Yamal (who also won the Golden Boy in 2024, awarded by the Italian sports newspaper Tuttosport to the best footballer in European football under the age of 21) has claimed his third Kopa, which recognizes him as the best footballer in the world under the age of 21. By age, he could still win a couple more...
Kopa Trophy ranking
- Lamine Yamal
- Pau Cubarsí
- Warren Zaïre-Emery
- Lennart Karl
- Yan Diomandé
- Ayyoub Bouaddi
- Kerim Alajbegovic
- Junior Kroupi
- Ibrahim Maza
- Johan Manzambi