Lamine Yamal is the most dangerous attacking player on the planet right now, and anyone still slotting him behind Kylian Mbappé or Ousmane Dembélé is arguing with their own eyes. In Oviedo on Saturday he needed six minutes to put Spain in front against Czechia, taking a pass from Dani Olmo and bending a left-footed shot into the top corner. Spain won 3-1. The 19-year-old barely broke sweat.
The scoreline is the least interesting thing about this. Rodri added a second before half time, Jirí Sláma gave Czechia a brief flicker on the counter, and substitute Mikel Merino finished it late. This was the third straight game this window Yamal decided early, a pattern now hard to miss. He scored inside two minutes away to England in a 3-2 win, scored inside two minutes against Croatia in a 4-1 rout where he also grabbed an assist, then put Czechia away in the sixth. Two second-minute goals against serious opponents, bookended by another before most people had found their seats.
This is a teenager deciding, repeatedly, to win games before they've properly started, against teams built to make him work, too often for it to be luck. A striker can ride a run of fortunate finishes. Nobody flukes their way to opening the scoring in three straight internationals against England, Croatia and Czechia.
The Messi comparisons and the early-goal counting are getting ahead of what a handful of fast starts actually prove, or so the argument goes. One good window doesn't settle a career, and the Ballon d'Or isn't handed out for October form. But the people making that case keep quietly moving the line. First it was that he was too young. Then that he hadn't carried a team, or won anything that mattered. Now he's producing the exact kind of recurring, match-deciding moments the award is supposed to reward, and the response is still to call it hype.
Dembélé left him out of his own top three. When your rivals are busy explaining why you don't belong in the conversation, you're already the conversation. Yamal has said he'd deserve it "because of what I've won," and the arrogance only grates if the football doesn't back it up. It backs it up.
The responsibility here sits with the voters and the pundits still hedging. Keeping Yamal out of the front rank of the Ballon d'Or race is stubbornness now. Every time he scores before the stadium has settled, it looks worse. Watch the games. He's already won the argument.
