All good things must eventually come to an end, even those footballers who have been at the top for so long that it feels like they’ll keep going forever.
This year’s Ballon d’Or ceremony will likely mark the 10th successive year that either Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo wins football’s top individual honour, but the pair will eventually hang up their boots.
For Ronaldo, that moment may come in 2021, when his new contract with Real Madrid expires, but former Los Blancos manager Carlo Ancelotti is already looking at the heir to the Portuguese star’s throne.
He has named the two players who he thinks will succeed Ronaldo and Messi as the dominant stars of the sport, or – as he describes them – ‘the heirs of Messi and Ronaldo’.
It’s not Gareth Bale, who moved to Madrid for a world record fee back in 2013. Rather, the Bayern Munich boss sees Argentina striker Paulo Dybala and Barcelona frontman Neymar as football’s next elite duo.
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Now, we know what you’re thinking – Dybala doesn’t even play in Spain, let alone for one of the teams involved in El Clasico – and he doesn’t need to, according to Ancelotti.
“Dybala can make history at Juventus over the next 10 years,” Ancelotti told TuttoSport, as reported by Metro.
“He is unique, you cannot compare him to any other player,” he said.
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Neymar already has one Ballon d’Or nomination, finishing third behind Messi and Ronaldo in 2015, while Dybala made the long list for the award for the first time this year.
The 22-year-old, who joined Juve from Palermo in the summer of 2015, has 27 goals for the Bianconeri in less than a season and a half in Turin.
Neymar, who turned 24 in February this year, has 37 Barcelona goals to his name in the corresponding period.
