Is Kevin De Bruyne actually underrated?

The Golden Ball for the 2014 World Cup went to Lionel Messi. He wasn’t the best player in the tournament. He wasn’t even the best player in that Argentina team in the tournament (Javier Mascherano was) but, in a broader sense, he was the best player in the world. The rationale felt blurred as Messi picked up yet another award. 

There is a case for saying that Kevin De Bruyne is the best footballer in the Premier League; his range of passing and crossing would make him remarkable in any time and, discounting an injury-hit 2018/19, he has 18, 16, 20 and 12 assists in his last four full seasons, a level of consistent creativity that is virtually unparalleled in its past. If previous eras in the division show spells when Eric Cantona, Thierry Henry and Cristiano Ronaldo were its dominant individual, perhaps this is the age of De Bruyne.

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None of that automatically made him the outstanding performer last season. But his peers (or enough of them, anyway) thought he was. De Bruyne was voted the PFA Player of the Year, retaining his title. Perhaps footballers identified Manchester City as the best team and De Bruyne as the best player in it. And in a sense, he is.

In another, he was perhaps the third or fourth most important contributor to City’s title. Ruben Dias was the transformative figure, a signing who dramatically improved both the defensive record and John Stones. Ilkay Gundogan was the catalyst, a two-month spurt of 11 goals crucial in City’s run of 21 successive victories. He was the slayer of Chelsea, Liverpool and Tottenham. If Gundogan’s brilliant burst was the outlier for him, De Bruyne’s form felt more typical.

And yet, and while players may have cast their votes in part because of his superb displays in City’s Champions League quarter- and semi-final triumphs, he was missed the pivotal win in their league season; the 4-1 at Anfield. He was also sidelined when they beat Tottenham 3-0.

Different electorates have different criteria. The Football Writers (this one included) plumped for Dias, the first defender to win their award since Steve Nicol in the 1980s. Last year, they overlooked De Bruyne too; Jordan Henderson was a symbolic choice, voters choosing Liverpool’s collective brilliance in an extended spell of record-breaking form over the Belgian’s individual brilliance.  

Every award is shaped by the context. Every nominee can lose out because of others’ excellence. Statistically, De Bruyne’s best season was 2019-20, when he mustered 13 league goals and a record-equalling 20 assists. A personal view is that his performance level peaked in 2017-18.

As City embarked on a 100-point campaign, he was shaping up as the frontrunner for the individual honours until Mohamed Salah, after what had seemed a prolific start to his debut season with Liverpool, went on an astonishing run of 24 goals in 22 games to accelerate past him. The Egyptian did the double of the PFA and FWA prizes.

Now De Bruyne has done a different sort of double, becoming only the third player to retain the PFA award with the distinction that while the other two – Henry and Ronaldo – also got the FWA vote in both seasons, he has in neither. Maybe that is an imbalance that will be corrected in forthcoming years. 

After all, there already is a sense that De Bruyne is a deserving winner of the PFA honour, even if this time maybe he won for the wrong year and perhaps now Dias will have to hope the luck evens itself out over several award seasons. But the midfielder has been anointed in very different campaigns, one where Liverpool were emphatic champions, another where City were, one where his numbers leapt off the page, another where they did not as much.

There is always the temptation to look for anomalies, to compare different players in different seasons, and, pathetically, for some in some quarters to invent agendas. Perhaps little thought goes into some of the ballots cast; perhaps some are low-information voters who have watched relatively few games. But one conclusion feels very simple. Other footballers think Kevin de Bruyne is a really good player. They are not wrong.

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