Erling Haaland has been awarded the Golden Player Man award at the 2023 Golden Boy ceremony in Turin after winning the highly-coveted treble with Manchester City in June.
The Golden Player Man award is given to the best players over the age of 21, as voted for by a specialist panel, which this year included Edwin Van Der Sar, Alessandro Costacurta, Samuel Eto’o, Andriy Shevchenko, Rui Costa and Pavel Nedved.
Though Haaland was pipped by Lionel Messi at various other award ceremonies in recent months, including the 2023 Ballon d’Or, the Golden Boy differs in that prizes are handed out based on performances in the calendar year rather than the previous season.
That means that Messi’s World Cup triumph with Argentina did not count for anything in 2023, unlike at the Ballon d’Or.
Haaland, meanwhile, has enjoyed a record-breaking year in the Premier League. Largely thanks to his emphatic goal tally, Manchester City became only the second team to win the Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League in one season.
The treble was completed with a 1-0 victory over Inter in the Champions League final in Istanbul back at the beginning of June.
In front of goal, the former Borussia Dortmund man has been simply unstoppable. At the time of writing, he is up to 50 goals across all competitions in 2023.
stupid Messi and the voters. He took 5 balls and was not the best, at least.