Honorable Mention - Wayne Rooney (England, Manchester United)
If ever there was somebody in football who could satisfy the figure of speech “Jack of all trades, master of none” one should look none beyond Rooney. OK, master of none is a bit too harsh on a player who is the highest goal scorer for his country, soon to be the highest scorer for his club. But for his potential, he woefully underachieved in his career, which is partly due to his versatility and willingness to do the dirty work for the team playing as a midfielder.
“The player I like is Wayne Rooney. For me, Rooney is a fantastic footballer. I can imagine him playing alongside me. For me, Rooney is not the player who scores 40 goals a season. But he is the player who helps his partner score lots of goals because he is working for one, two and maybe three other players. It seems like he has a strong mentality to win” Zlatan Ibrahimovic aptly describes Rooney.
He is one person whom you could count on to give everything for the team on the football field, be it making delightful cross field long balls, taking free kicks, penalties, scoring crucial goals, scoring long-range goals, creating many a chance for his teammates, tracking back the entire length of the field to defend as the last man. He is a total team player who is any manager’s dream. Over the last 2 seasons, his performances have dwindled, but Rooney’s form in the Euro’s will be the difference between glory and another shambolic campaign for England.
Why David Alaba is the most complete player in the world currently?
This might come as a surprise to few people seeing the name of David Alaba as the most complete player in the world, but those who follow Bundesliga and Champions League regularly know the value of the player. He is massively underrated outside Bavaria and Austria, with not many people recognizing the genius of the 23-year-old.
Where do you start when trying to describe the full extent of his game? It is hard to really categorize Alaba as a defense minded player or an attacking player, wherever he plays on the field he looks the real deal playing in that position. He was Pep Guardiola’s tactical muse at Bayern Munich, popping up as a centre-back, full-back, holding player, box-to-box midfielder, wide-man, second striker, set-piece specialist and whatever role the manager requires him to don.
Regardless of the position he plays on the field, it is Alaba who sees most of the ball for Bayern. Such is his importance and ever-growing influence within one of the best teams in the world that he regularly sends and receives more passes than any other player for the Bavarians on a match day.
Running out of superlatives to describe the magician at his disposal, Guardiola went a notch up, “David Alaba is our god. He has already played almost all 10 positions.” His versatility enabled Bayern to play in a formation without any central defenders but the real picture of his intelligence, vision and array of other abilities comes to the fore when he turns up for Austria in the midfield.
It is safe to say that without his calming influence in the middle of the park for Austria, they would have found it difficult to even qualify for Euro 2016, let alone topping their group. He finished the qualifiers with 4 goals, 3 assists and truckload of chances created. Undoubtedly he will be one of the players to watch out for in the ongoing tournament.
His tackling and heading of the ball is something which he will look to improve in the coming years and working under Carlo Ancelotti augurs well to further improve his overall game.
At 24 years of age, he has the footballing world at his feet, and from 26 - 30 when all the footballers are at their peak it is safe to say that he will be one of the best players in the world if not the best. But for him to get all the accolades and the recognition of the world, like Messi and Ronaldo it is imperative for him to play as advanced in the final 3rd as possible, if that happens then we can surely see him contending for the Ballon d’Or in the near future.
