Ousmane Dembele shared with his more than 18 million followers on Instagram his Ballon d’Or award presented by France Football, which recognises him as the best player in the world.
A lot of joy, pride and excitement. A dream come true. Thank you to everyone who has always supported me on this journey
“I am very happy, proud and excited. A dream come true. Thank you to everyone who has always supported me on this journey,” wrote the PSG player.
“Great Ous! Congratulations, I’m very happy for you. You deserve it
That comment received thousands of comments in a few moments, among them the one dedicated to him by his former teammate Leo Messi.
“Great Ous! Congratulations, I’m very happy for you. You deserve it,” wrote Messi on Instagram.
Leo Messi, who has won the Ballon d’Or eight times, played with Ousmane Dembele at Barcelona from 2017 to 2021.
The Messi advice that changed Dembele’s career: “After that…”
Messi and Dembele always had a good relationship, and as a sign of this, the Frenchman’s confession about Leo’s advice that changed his career will go down in history.
I always had a great relationship with Messi, from day one. My locker was right next to his and he gave me a lot of advice. He was someone who knew what you needed instinctively. For me he is the greatest, he is a player who inspires me,” Dembele explained in August 2025 in Four Four Two magazine.
Ousmane Dembele revealed that “Messi told me to be serious if I wanted to reach my dreams. After that, I started to observe and learn from what he did on the pitch.”
Ousmane Dembele after winning the Ballon d’Or: “Luis Enrique is like my father”
In the same interview, the new Ballon d’Or winner admitted that “at PSG I have a lot of confidence in Luis Enrique. He gave me total freedom on the pitch. Before the Champions League final, people were shouting at me: ‘Ballon d’Or!’. It’s the Holy Grail of football, on an individual level there’s nothing better for a footballer,” said the Frenchman.
After receiving the Ballon d’Or, Dembele expressed his gratitude to Luis Enrique: “I want to thank PSG who came looking for me in 2023, the whole team, the club which is a family, the president and all the staff who have behaved well… Luis Enrique has been wonderful, he has behaved very well with me and is like my father.”
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