Vinicius Jr has seen his career explode with the influence of Carlo Ancelotti on the Real Madrid bench, and he is becoming decisive in almost every match, and the consequence of that has been a vast rise in his market value, with the Brazilian topping a list of the most valuable under-23 players in the world.
CIES Football Observatory has drawn up a list based on what players have achieved to this point, their age and the duration of their contract left in order to determine what their market value is.
Crucially, this is why Kylian Mbappe is only valued at 80 million euros, because in less than four weeks he can sign a pre-contract agreement with any club he wants outside of France, ahead of a free transfer in the summer.
Gianluigi Donnarumma is the unsurprising choice for the most valuable goalkeeper, whilst the best central defenders are Eric Garcia and Josko Gvardiol of Barcelona and RB Leipzig, respectively.
Alphonso Davies is valued at 120 million euros as the best full-back, whilst Jude Bellingham, Florian Wirtz and Pedri are the highest valued central midfielders.
Ferran Torres is in sixth place in the forwards list with a value of 120 million euros, with Erling Haaland and Phil Foden near the top, just below Vinicius Jr.
Mason Greenwood, Jadon Sancho, Joao Felix, Mbappe, Moussa Diaby and Jeremy Pino round off the selection of forwards.
Interestingly, 17 of the 60 most valuable under-21 footballers play in the Premier League, whilst there are only 12 that play in LaLiga Santander. The Bundesliga has 14 representatives whilst Serie A has just seven.
In terms of club representation, Bayer Leverkusen has six players and is the most represented club, followed by Barcelona (5) and Chelsea (4).
Seven of the 60 players are Spanish, which suggests a bright medium-term future for the Spanish national team.
