We at Twenty First Group noted that the voting for last week’s Kopa Trophy – awarded to the best under-21 footballer in the world – very closely matched our own Player Model ranking for the world’s best young players.

With that in mind, below is our prediction for the 2024 Kopa Trophy, based on our Player Model’s projection of future performance.

That our model so closely correlates with real-world outcomes has its benefits, namely scale. While only a tiny number of clubs can afford the ten best under-21 players, most will have an interest in at least some of the other 8000+ for whom we have ranked on current and projected performance levels.