Lokomotiv midfielder Batrakov named the best football player in Russia

The best Russian football player of 2025 according to the results of the vote of the newspaper "Sport-Express" was the midfielder of "Lokomotiv" Alexey Batrakov. The jury members, including reputable coaches, managers and thousands of fans, chose an athlete who is already being compared to Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, an Izvestia correspondent said on December 22.

Batrakov became the brightest discovery of last season, as well as the top scorer of the current season, and thus forever inscribed his name in the history of Russian sports. The midfielder has 16 goals and six assists since the beginning of the season, plus three assists for the national team, correspondent Dmitry Zimenkin noted.

It only took a couple of touches to score his debut goal in his first game for the national team. With another shot, Batrakov scored a masterpiece goal in the match against Iran.

In a year and a half, the value of a Russian football player has increased more than 25 times. According to the Transfermarkt portal, the athlete's price is 25 million euros — more expensive than Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. He also turned out to be more expensive than the main character of PSG, Matvey Safonov.

"Alexey is a very versatile football player. He knows how to score and give assists, shoots free kicks, gives corners, and has a good long—range shot, which is why he was chosen the best player of 2025," said Konstantin Alekseev, editor-in-chief of the football department of Sport-Express.

For Batrakov himself, the main current event of the year is the victory over Spartak and his crazy hat-trick. The 20-year-old football player reacts wisely beyond his years to numerous compliments addressed to him. His main goal in 2026 is to lead his native Lokomotiv to victory, the Russian is not interested in European clubs yet.

"Everyone thinks I'm already there, at PSG, Monaco, Inter, Barcelona. But in fact, so far everything is far from that, so again, I try not to bother my head with all this," Batrakov said.

"Now I understand some football things even better than before."

Honored Coach of the Russian Federation Yuri Semin — about the legends of the golden Locomotive, today's heroes of the Russian Premier League and Izmailov's superiority over Messi and Neymar

On December 4, the ceremony of awarding the prize "For Loyalty" named after the former player of the Spartak football club and the USSR national team, Fedor Cherenkov, took place in Moscow. Konstantin Tyukavin, a football player from FC Dynamo, became the winner in the "Best Pupil" nomination, and Andrey Parkin, the goalkeeper of Cherepovets, was named the best in the "Second League" category. The award "For contribution to Russian football" was awarded to the president of Makhachkala Dynamo, Haji Hajiyev.

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