With the 2026 Ballon d’Or nominees all revealed, we look at the key stats behind the 30 players who will be in contention for the men’s award on Monday 26 October.
Jude Bellingham
The 2025-26 club season wasn’t especially successful for Marc Cucurella (750).
The left-back played every minute of every game in North America, making him a key part of comfortably the best defence at the tournament.
Spain conceded just one goal across their eight games and allowed chances worth a mere 0.3 expected goals per game. Cucurella’s trademark feistiness and energy undoubtedly contributed to La Roja winning the World Cup for the second time.
Ousmane Dembélé
Reigning Ballon d’Or winner Erling Haaland’s 27 Premier League goals for Manchester City in 2025-26 saw him win the competition’s Golden Boot for the third time in four seasons; only Thierry Henry and Mohamed Salah (4) have won the award more often than him.
Haaland also scored 20 goals in just 12 international matches for Norway across the 2025-26 season too, including seven at the World Cup. His two goals in the last-16 win over Brazil meant he’d scored in 14 consecutive competitive internationals.
Achraf Hakimi
Sadio Mané. The former Liverpool and Bayern Munich winger won silverware for club and country, playing a key role in Senegal winning the Africa Cup of Nations (or finishing as runners-up, depending on whatever appeal process you believe).
Mané recorded two goals and three assists in Morocco, but arguably more impressively, he created 19 chances from open play, at least eight more than any other player at the AFCON. He also created more than twice as many chances from open play for Senegal (12) as any of his teammates at the World Cup this summer.
Mané also managed 10 goals and six assists in 25 games for Al-Nassr on their way to winning the Saudi Pro League.
Marquinhos
The PSG captain led his team to a second consecutive Champions League title, having also won his 11th Ligue 1 title.
Marquinhos was one of the players Luis Enrique largely saved for the Champions League, with 15 of his 32 appearances for PSG in all competitions last season coming in the UCL.
His leadership and defensive solidity helped them navigate their way to another success in the competition, lifting the famous trophy aloft in Budapest following their penalty-shootout win over Arsenal.
Marquinhos also started all five of Brazil’s games at the World Cup, though they were eliminated by Norway in the last 16.
Lautaro Martínez
Lionel Messi managed a frankly ridiculous 52 goal involvements in just 30 Major League Soccer appearances for Inter Miami over the qualifying period for the 2026 Ballon d’Or award, topping both the goal (29) and assist (23) rankings in the competition. He also created the most chances in MLS both overall (97) and from open play (78) over the period in question.
Internationally, Messi scored 13 goals and assisted seven more in 14 games for Argentina between 3 August 2025 to 19 July 2026, including 12 goal involvements at the 2026 World Cup – his last edition of the tournament.
João Neves
Seven goals and four assists for Julián Quiñones enjoyed his best ever domestic season in front of goal in 2025-26 as the Al-Qadsiah forward netted 37 times in 35 appearances across all competitions. Thirty-three of those goals came in the Saudi Pro League, making him the top scorer in the competition last season ahead of Ivan Toney (32) and Cristiano Ronaldo (28).
Quiñones also performed well at the World Cup, scoring the first goal of the tournament and ultimately top-scoring for co-hosts Mexico with four goals, as well as being their leading chance creator (10).
Declan Rice
“It’s not done yet”.
If there was one player who typified Arsenal’s title-winning campaign in 2025-26, then it was surely Fabián Ruiz should probably be one of the front runners for the award. He is one of only 10 players ever to have won the World Cup and the European Cup/Champions League in the same season, while playing both finals.
Ruiz scored two goals and assisted five more in 34 games in all competitions for PSG, before playing a part in all eight games for Spain at the World Cup (four starts), scoring the opening goal of the quarter-final victory over Belgium.
William Saliba
The elegance to Gabriel’s steel. Dayot Upamecano. He helped Bayern Munich to a Bundesliga and DFB-Pokal double but had to make do with semi-final finishes in the Champions League and World Cup.
For a while, France looked to be the team to beat in North America this summer, only to be outdone by eventual winners Spain in the semis. The only outfielder to rack up more minutes than Upamecano (661) for Les Bleus at the World Cup was Kylian Mbappé (698).
The one game he didn’t start was the third-place play-off defeat to England. He came on at half-time with France 4-0 down; they only conceded two after his introduction, though still lost 6-4.
Prior to the semis, France conceded just two goals in six games, and Upamecano played all but the last 14 minutes against Norway.
Vinícius Júnior
Vitinha was superb again in the middle of the park for the French and European champions last season.
Everyone knows about his passing proficiency – he completed 1,589 passes in the Champions League last season, a whopping 481 more than anyone else – but he also did his work off the ball. No player won possession in the opposition’s final third as often as Vitinha did (17).
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Ballon d’Or 2026: The Best Stats For All 30 Nominees Opta Analyst.
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