10 - Lautaro Martinez ( $128.3 million )
Lautaro Javier Martínez ( born 22 August 1997) is an Argentine professional footballer who plays as a striker for Italian club Inter Milan and the Argentina national team.
He began his football career in his native Argentina where he made his senior debut in 2015 with Racing Club. There he spent four seasons and represented the club in the league and Copa Libertadores, scoring 27 goals in 60 appearances before joining Inter in 2018.
Martínez officially joined Inter on 4 July 2018 for a reported fee of €22.7 million and he signed a five-year contract with the club. He made his unofficial debut ten days later and scored in a 3–0 friendly win over Swiss club, Lugano. His full debut followed on 19 August when he started in a 1–0 Serie A loss to Sassuolo in the opening week. He scored his first league goal against Cagliari, the opener of a 2–0 win at San Siro on 29 September.
Martínez scored his first European goal on 14 February 2019, netting a penalty to help Inter win against Rapid Wien, in the first leg of 2018–19 UEFA Europa League round of 32. Following this match, he began to start in every match, profiting from Mauro Icardi’s abstinence due to personal reasons. In his first Derby Della Madonnina match against city rivals Milan, Martínez first assisted Matías Vecino’s header before scoring himself a penalty in the second half, helping Inter to win 3–2; Inter retook the third place in Serie A, and also achieved the first league double over them since 2011–12 season.
On 2 October 2019, Martínez scored his first goal in UEFA Champions League in a 2–1 away defeat to Barcelona in the group stage; he becomes the first player since Roberto Boninsegna in 1970 to score at Camp Nou for Inter. Later in the competition, by scoring a brace in a 3–1 away win against Slavia Prague, Martínez reached two milestones: he becomes only the fourth Inter player (after Hernán Crespo in 2002, Christian Vieri in 2003 and Samuel Eto’o in 2010) and the fifth Argentinian player (after Hernan Crespo in 2002, Lionel Messi in six occasions, Sergio Agüero in 2019 and Ezequiel Lavezzi in 2013) to score in four consecutive Champions League games.
9 - Antoine Griezmann ( $137.1 million )
Antoine Griezmann ( born 21 March 1991) is a French professional footballer who plays as a forward for Spanish club Barcelona and the French national team.
Griezmann is a former French youth international, representing his country at under-19, under-20 and under-21 level, and was part of the team that won the 2010 UEFA European Under-19 Championship on home soil. He earned his first cap for the senior national team in 2014, and played at that year’s World Cup, helping his country to the quarter-finals. At UEFA Euro 2016, France finished runners-up as hosts, while Griezmann was the top goalscorer and was voted the Player of the Tournament. He later won the 2018 FIFA World Cup, a tournament in which he scored four goals, which earned him the Silver Boot as the second-highest goalscorer of the tournament, won the Bronze Ball as the third-best player, and was named man of the match in the final.
Born and raised in Mâcon, Griezmann began his senior career as a member of Spanish side Real Sociedad in 2009, with whom he won the Segunda División title in his first season, departing five seasons later to join Atlético Madrid for a then-club record €30 million. Although featuring mostly as a winger during his time with Sociedad, Griezmann adapted his game in Madrid to become a complete forward, and quickly became the focal point of the team. He went on to break the club’s scoring record for a debut season and was named in the 2014–15 La Liga Team of the Season. He was also named La Liga Best Player in 2016 and finished third for both the 2016 Ballon d’Or and 2016 Best FIFA Men’s Player awards. Griezmann was again nominated for the awards in 2018, finishing third and sixth respectively, as he helped Atlético win the 2017–18 UEFA Europa League, scoring twice in the final. Griezmann also won the 2014 Supercopa de España and 2018 UEFA Super Cup during his time in Madrid and ranks as the club’s fifth-highest goalscorer. In July 2019, Griezmann departed Atlético to join league rivals Barcelona in a €120 million deal, making him the joint-fourth most expensive football player of all-time.
He had begun his career playing for hometown club UF Mâcon. While there, he embarked on several trials with professional clubs in order to earn a spot in one of their youth academies but was rejected because clubs questioned his size and lightweight frame. In 2005, while on trial with Montpellier, Griezmann played in a friendly match against the youth academy of Paris Saint-Germain in Paris, and impressed several clubs, notably Spanish club Real Sociedad, whose scouts were attending the event.
Following the match, the club’s officials offered Griezmann a one-week trial in San Sebastián, which he accepted. He was later offered a second-week stay at the club. The club then contacted his parents and formally offered the player a youth contract. Griezmann’s parents were initially reluctant to have their son move to Spain, but allowed him to make the move after positive reassurances. Because Griezmann spent time at the youth level in a Basque club, he is potentially available to play for Athletic Bilbao, in spite of being born and growing up in the non-Basque areas of France.
8 - Lionel Messi ( $139.2 million )
Lionel Andrés Messi Cuccittini ( born 24 June 1987) is an Argentine professional footballer who plays as a forward and captains both Spanish club Barcelona and the Argentina national team. Often considered the best player in the world and widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Messi has won a record six Ballon d’Or awards, and a record six European Golden Shoes. He has spent his entire professional career with Barcelona, where he has won a club-record 34 trophies, including ten La Liga titles, four UEFA Champions League titles and six Copas del Rey. A prolific goalscorer and a creative playmaker, Messi holds the records for most goals in La Liga (438), a La Liga and European league season (50), most hat-tricks in La Liga (36) and the UEFA Champions League (8), and most assists in La Liga (181) and the Copa América (12). He has scored over 700 senior career goals for club and country.
Born and raised in central Argentina, Messi relocated to Spain to join Barcelona at age 13, for whom he made his competitive debut aged 17 in October 2004. He established himself as an integral player for the club within the next three years, and in his first uninterrupted season in 2008–09 he helped Barcelona achieve the first treble in Spanish football; that year, aged 22, Messi won his first Ballon d’Or. Three successful seasons followed, with Messi winning three consecutive Ballon d’Or, making him the first player to win the award four times.
He has spent his entire professional career with Barcelona, where he has won a club-record 34 trophies, including ten La Liga titles, four UEFA Champions League titles and six Copas del Rey. A prolific goalscorer and a creative playmaker, Messi holds the records for most goals in La Liga, a La Liga and European league season, most hat-tricks in La Liga and the UEFA Champions League, and most assists in La Liga and the Copa América. He has scored over 700 senior career goals for club and country.
he set the La Liga and European records for most goals scored in a single season while establishing himself as Barcelona’s all-time top scorer. The following two seasons, Messi finished second for the Ballon d’Or behind Cristiano Ronaldo (his perceived career rival), before regaining his best form during the 2014–15 campaign, becoming the all-time top scorer in La Liga and leading Barcelona to a historic second treble, after which he was awarded a fifth Ballon d’Or in 2015. Messi assumed the captaincy of Barcelona in 2018, and in 2019 he secured a record sixth Ballon d’Or.
An Argentine international, Messi is his country’s all-time leading goalscorer. At the youth level, he won the 2005 FIFA World Youth Championship, finishing the tournament with both the Golden Ball and Golden Shoe, and an Olympic gold medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics. His style of play as a diminutive, left-footed dribbler drew comparisons with his compatriot Diego Maradona, who described Messi as his successor. After his senior debut in August 2005, Messi became the youngest Argentine to play and score in a FIFA World Cup during the 2006 edition and reached the final of the 2007 Copa América, where he was named young player of the tournament. As the squad’s captain from August 2011, he led Argentina to three consecutive finals: the 2014 FIFA World Cup, for which he won the Golden Ball, and the 2015 and 2016 Copas América. After announcing his international retirement in 2016, he reversed his decision and led his country to qualification for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, and a third-place finish at the 2019 Copa América.
7 - Marcus Rashford ( $149 million )
Marcus Rashford Manchester United star (born 31 October 1997) is an English professional footballer who plays as a forward for Premier League club Manchester United and the England national team.
A Manchester United player from the age of seven, he scored two goals on both his first-team debut against Midtjylland in the UEFA Europa League in February 2016 and his Premier League debut against Arsenal three days later. He also scored in his first Manchester derby match, his first EFL Cup match, and his first UEFA Champions League match. With United, Rashford has so far won the FA Cup, EFL Cup, FA Community Shield, and UEFA Europa League.
Rashford scored on his England debut in May 2016, becoming the youngest English player to score in his first senior international match. He played at the UEFA Euro 2016 as the tournament’s youngest player, and at the 2018 FIFA World Cup.
6 - Harry Kane ( $166.9 million )
Harry Edward Kane MBE (born 28 July 1993) is an English professional footballer who plays as a striker for Premier League club Tottenham Hotspur and captains the England national team. Born and raised in the London district of Walthamstow, Kane began his professional career at Tottenham Hotspur, where, after fast progression through the team’s youth academy.
Kane has won six Premier League Player of the Month awards (one behind record-holder Sergio Agüero) and has been selected for the PFA Team of the Year four times. In November 2019, he became Tottenham’s third-highest all-time goalscorer in official competitions.
Kane’s involvement at Tottenham began to increase following the appointment of Mauricio Pochettino as head coach in 2014. In his first full season at the club, Kane scored 31 goals across all competitions, and finished as the league’s second-highest goalscorer, winning the PFA Young Player of the Year award. After the following campaign, at age 23, Kane finished as league’s top goalscorer and guided the club to UEFA Champions League qualification.
Kane has scored 32 goals in 45 games for England. He appeared and scored at every youth level and made his senior debut in March 2015, aged 21, scoring in that game. Kane featured and scored during UEFA Euro 2016 qualifying, but although he played in the tournament itself he did not score. He was made the squad’s captain from May 2018, prior to the 2018 FIFA World Cup. In that tournament Kane led England to fourth place, their highest finish since 1990. He also finished as the top goalscorer, winning the Golden Boot.
He was promoted to the senior team in 2009, at age 16. He did not initially feature for the side and was loaned out several times to clubs across the English football pyramid, including Leyton Orient, Millwall, Leicester City, and Norwich City.
In the 2016–17 season, Kane also completed the season as the league’s top goalscorer and helped the club finish as the competition’s runners-up, winning the PFA Fans’ Player of the Year award in the process. In the 2017–18 season, Kane registered his best campaign statistically to date, with 41 goals scored in 48 games in all competitions, and in the following season, he finished as a runner-up in the UEFA Champions League.
5 - Sadio Mané ( $172.6 million )
Sadio Mané (born 10 April 1992) is a Senegalese professional footballer who plays as a winger for Premier League club Liverpool and the Senegal national team.
Mané began his professional career with Ligue 2 club, Metz, at age 19, but he departed after a solitary season to join Austrian club Red Bull Salzburg in 2012 for a fee of €4 million, winning a domestic double of the Austrian Football Bundesliga and the Austrian Cup in the 2013–14 season. Later that summer, Mané transferred to English club Southampton for a club-record fee of £11.8 million, where he set a new Premier League record for the fastest hat-trick, scored in 176 seconds in a 6–1 win over Aston Villa in 2015.
He signed for fellow Premier League side Liverpool in 2016, for a reported fee of £34 million. With Liverpool, Mané helped them reach back-to-back UEFA Champions League Finals in 2018 and 2019, winning the latter. He also finished as the league’s joint-top goalscorer in the 2018–19 season, winning the Premier League Golden Boot. The same year, he finished fourth for the Ballon d’Or and fifth for The Best FIFA Men’s Player award. In January 2020, he was named the African Footballer of the Year for 2019.
At the international level, Mané has registered 19 goals in 69 appearances for Senegal since his debut in 2012 and currently ranks as his nation’s fifth all-time top goalscorer, and eighth all-time for appearances. He has represented the national team at the 2012 Olympics, as well as the 2015 and 2017 editions of the Africa Cup of Nations. In the 2019 iteration, Mané helped Senegal to a runners-up finish. He has also represented Senegal at the 2018 FIFA World Cup; their second-ever appearance in the competition.
4 - Jadon Sancho ( $187.3 million )
Jadon Malik Sancho (born 25 March 2000) is an English professional footballer who plays as a winger for Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund and the England national team.
Previously a youth player with Watford and Manchester City, Sancho signed his first senior contract with Dortmund in 2017. In his second season, he established himself as a first-team regular and was named in the 2018–19 Bundesliga Team of the Season. Ahead of the 2019–20 season, Sancho won his first trophy following the DFL-Supercup victory over Bayern Munich.
Sancho was part of the England youth team that won the 2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup and made his debut for the senior team in 2018.
3 - Mohamed Salah ( $194.2 million )
Mohamed Salah Hamed Mahrous Ghaly. (Born 15 June 1992) is an Egyptian professional footballer who plays as a forward for Premier League club Liverpool and the Egyptian national team. Considered one of the best players in the world, he is known for his finishing, dribbling, and speed.
Salah started his senior career with Egyptian club El Mokawloon, departing shortly thereafter to join the Swiss side, Basel, for an undisclosed fee. In Switzerland, his performances attracted Premier League side Chelsea, who signed him for in 2014. However, he was used sparingly in his debut season and was allowed to leave on loan to Serie A clubs Fiorentina and Roma, with the latter eventually signing him permanently for €15 million. Following his role in helping Roma to a second-place finish and a club record points-tally in 2017, Salah returned to the Premier League to sign for Liverpool for a then club-record fee of £36.9 million.
Salah won the Premier League Golden Boot in 2017-18 with 32 goals a new record for a 38-game campaign – and retained the accolade the following season alongside teammate Mane and Arsenal’s Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
He was also named PFA Players’ Player of the Year and FWA Footballer of the Year at the end of his first year with the Reds and carried his stellar form into a memorable 2018-19 that concluded with the first piece of silverware of his Liverpool career.
At the international level, Salah represented Egypt at the youth level. Following his performances at the 2012 Summer Olympics, he was named CAF Most Promising African Talent of the Year. Since then, he has helped Egypt reach the final of the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations, and was top scorer during CAF qualification to help the team qualify for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. Salah has been named the CAF African Footballer of the Year (2017 and 2018), BBC African Footballer of the Year (2017 and 2018), and was selected in the Africa Cup of Nations Team of the Tournament and CAF Team of the Year.
2 - Raheem Sterling ( $248.1 million )
Raheem Shaquille Sterling (born 8 December 1994) is a professional footballer who plays as a winger and attacking midfielder for Premier League club Manchester City and the England national team. He is often considered to be one of the best players in the world.
Born in Jamaica, Sterling moved to London at the age of five and began his career at Queens Park Rangers before signing for Liverpool in 2010. He was awarded the Golden Boy award in 2014. In July 2015, following a lengthy dispute over a new contract, he was signed by Manchester City in a transfer potentially worth £49 million, the highest transfer fee ever paid for an English player at the time. He then went on to help Manchester City win back-to-back Premier League titles in the 2017–18 and 2018–19 seasons. In the 2018–19 season, he was named to the PFA Premier League Team of the Year and won the PFA Young Player of the Year and FWA Footballer of the Year.
Sterling made his senior debut for England in November 2012 after previously being capped by England youth teams at under-16, under-17, under-19, and under-21 levels. He was chosen in England’s squads for the 2014 and 2018 FIFA World Cups and UEFA Euro 2016.
1 - Kylian Mbappé ( $294.1 million )
Kylian Mbappé Lottin (born 20 December 1998) is a French professional footballer who plays as a forward for Ligue 1 club Paris Saint-Germain and the France national team. Considered one of the best players in the world, he is known for his finishing, dribbling, and speed.
Mbappé started his senior career with Ligue 1 club Monaco, where he made his professional debut in 2015, aged 16. With them, he won a Ligue 1 title, Ligue 1 Young Player of the Year, and the Golden Boy award. In 2017, he signed for league rivals Paris Saint-Germain on an initial loan, which was made permanent in 2018 in a transfer worth €180 million, making him the second-most expensive player, and most expensive teenager, ever. With PSG, Mbappé has won three Ligue 1 titles, a Coupe de France, has finished as Ligue 1 top scorer twice, won Ligue 1 Player of the Year, and is the seventh-highest goalscorer in the club’s history.
At the international level, Mbappé made his senior debut for France in 2017, at age 18. At the 2018 FIFA World Cup, Mbappé became the youngest French player to score at a World Cup, and became the second teenager, after Pelé, to score in a World Cup Final. He finished as the joint second-highest goalscorer as France won the tournament, and he received the Best Young Player and French Player of the Year awards for his performances.