PSG’s Ousmane Dembélé takes centre stage as football’s chief late bloomer

Timekeeping used to be an issue for the Frenchman but now his rapid pressing is pushing him towards a Ballon d'Or

Ousmane Dembele is right behind you and way ahead of everyone, which is just where Luis Enrique always imagined him. At the end of Paris Saint-Germain's destruction of Real Madrid in the semi-final of the Club World Cup in New Jersey this week, the coach declared his No 10 the season's best player by far"; not so much for the 35 goals and 16 assists but for something more simple. So simple it has taken a decade to do. But then Didier Deschamps, his national team manager with France, did say that being late is a little habit of his".

Well, it was. If there is a portrait that defines the PSG team potentially 90 minutes from winning it all, an image that embodies them and Dembele's transformation, it may be that shot of him poised, coiled, at the edge of Inter's area in the Champions League final. Toes on the line, his eyes narrow and fixed on Yann Sommer like a leopard ready to pounce, a sprinter listening for the gun. It is a scene repeated relentlessly, opponents made prey, Wednesday at the MetLife another episode. I told him he was pressing a lot; he told me he has to," Madrid's keeper, Thibaut Courtois, said. I get half a second to think."