Despite being only 17, the Spain international is arguably the most feared forward in the game right now.
In last week’s Champions League matchup with Barcelona, Denzel Dumfries was outstanding for Inter, scoring two goals and setting up another in a thrilling 3-3 draw. Although the Dutchman deserved to win Player of the Match, he wasn’t the main attraction. Everyone was talking about Lamine Yamal after the 17-year-old stunned the world with yet another illogical display of talent.
“This guy is incredible,” Erling Haaland, a striker for Manchester City, wrote on Snapchat. Meanwhile, Bukayo Saka had trouble putting Yamal into words: “Really, what can you say about him doing what he is doing at his age? He’s unbelievable. It’s not typical. Nobody does that.
Yamal is without a doubt the best teenage talent the game has ever seen, and Saka is correct. No one has ever been so talented at such a young age. Not Lionel Messi. No, not Ronaldo. Not even Pele.
At 16, Yamal dominated a Euro 2024 semifinal. He is currently dominating the Champions League. As a result, the question now isn’t whether Yamal is the world’s best young player, but rather whether he is the greatest player overall.
Before last week’s match in Catalunya, Inter and Italy defender Alessandro Bastoni was asked how he and his teammates planned to stop Yamal. He responded, “I don’t think I’ve seen a 45 minute like that before.” “I don’t know,” the center-back told Gazzetta dello Sport, “because it didn’t go so well the last time at the Euros.” Well, that’s putting it mildly.
In one of the most thorough 1-0 losses in football history, Yamal and fellow Spain winger Nico Williams relentlessly tormented the Italy defense, which included Bastoni and Federico Dimarco.
Last Wednesday was even more difficult for the Inter pair because, although Dumfries helped their team secure a well-earned share of the victory at Montjuic, Yamal gave them even more defensive problems, especially during a spectacular first-half display in which the teenager pulled Barca back into the game with a solo goal a la Messi before hitting the crossbar after leaving more defenders in his wake.
TNT Sports commentator Ally McCoist admitted, “I don’t think I have seen a 45 minute like that from one individual before in my life.” “It’s unbelievable.”
“A talent that emerges once every fifty years”
Only because Nerazzurri coach Simone Inzaghi felt he had no choice but to treble up on the teenager did Yamal’s influence somewhat wane in the second half.
The Nerazzurri coach told Amazon Prime Italia, “Seeing Lamine up close really impressed me. He’s the kind of talent that comes along every 50 years.” We had to double up the marking each time because of him, but it wasn’t enough. We had to sit deeper because we had to place three players on him, and obviously, this created space elsewhere.
Yamal had more touches of the ball (102) than any other player on the field, with the exception of Barca midfielders Pedri (107) and Frenkie de Jong (112), despite the closer attention. He also finished with the most dribbles (six) and whipped over more crosses (10) than all of Inter’s players combined.
