Alphonso Davies robbed as Erling Haaland wins the Golden Boy award

First it was Robert Lewandowski and the Ballon d’Or, and now yet another Bayern Munich player has been robbed of an individual honor. Borussia Dortmund striker Erling Haaland has just beaten Alphonso Davies to the Golden Boy award, despite the latter winning the Champions League and the treble this season.

The award, which is given out by Italian newspaper Tuttosport, apparently uses some combination of a popular vote and a panel of so-called global “experts”. If they think Haaland is better than Phonzie, then their expertise is rather overrated. In fact, Davies didn’t even come second, with that honor going to Barcelona forward Ansu Fati. Here is the full top-ten, along with the vote margins for each:

Can we demand a recount? Okay, I’m just joking but ... that list is complete nonsense. Phonzie has won as many trophies this season than the rest of the top 10 combined. He’s the best left-back in the world right now, and was critical to Bayern’s Champions League win last season.

Meanwhile, Haaland can’t get Dortmund over the line against PSG, Ansu Fati is only barely starting for the worst Barcelona side in over a decade, and Sancho disappears against decent opposition. Camavinga, Kulusevski, Foden, and Szoboszlai obviously haven’t done it at the top level like Davies has (and by top-level, I mean the level of teams that contend for the UCL), while Saka is a discount Phonzie. As for Vinicius Jr, well we’ll just let Benzema handle that one.

It just goes to show how underrated Bayern Munich players still are by the common consciousness.

Whenever Bayern faced BVB last season, Davies pocketed Haaland and Sancho with ease. When Bayern faced Barcelona, Phonzie ripped them to shreds while Fati sat on the bench and watched. Davies lifted the Champions League as a starter at 19, only 18 months after arriving as a teenager from MLS. He’s the most qualified Golden Boy candidate in years.

People might say “oh, he didn’t win because he’s a defender”, but Matthijs de Ligt won the thing when Ajax made a deep run in the UCL. Phonzie won the damn thing, and he only gets third place. The sad truth is, being Canadian and being a Bayern player probably doesn’t help Phonzie’s chances in these individual awards, which are basically popularity contests. He’ll just have to content himself with even more trophies.