A series of commanding defensive displays by Dayot Upamecano for Die Roten in 2025/26 has brought the player a 2026 Ballon d’Or nomination.

A little more than a decade separates two very contrasting moments in Dayot Upamecano’s life.

In the first instance he is a schoolboy in Évreux, France, and as typically occurs in class the teacher is calling pupils up to the blackboard.

Terrified of social interactions, Upamecano shrinks into his seat and prays that he is not chosen. A day off from the taunts would be welcomed. A respite from the bullying yearned for.

Since the age of eight, the boy has suffered from a repetitious stammer, an affliction the other kids were quick to jump on and tease.

They find it highly amusing that this shy, awkward child dreams of one day becoming a professional footballer. This wallflower who struggles to speak!

To his immense credit, since establishing himself as a defender of real note at Red Bull Salzburg, RB Leipzig and latterly Bayern Munich, the player has subsequently shared his childhood experiences, largely to inspire those enduring similar problems. He has been eloquent and candid about his early speech condition, along with the crippling shyness that accompanied it.

In 2023, he told the Guardian…

“I was very scared. When you have a stammer you’re scared to talk because people will make fun of you. It’s difficult to distance yourself from it.”

“You don’t want to go up to the blackboard, or communicate in general, because you know people will be mocking you.”

A personal zenith, even in defeat  

It is the 2022 World Cup final and Dayot Upamecano is no longer silenced by fear.

He shouts at Adrien Rabiot to drop deeper so as to double-up on Lionel Messi. He screams at Theo Hernández to tuck in.

France may lose on penalties that day but the star acquits himself well in the biggest game of his life. He is assertive and confident; a colossus in stature in full control of himself and his surroundings. Not for the first time, and not for the last, he does his country proud.

Upamecano grew up with four sisters, who all encouraged him to talk, regardless of his stammer, and relating to his football aspirations they would often remind him of an uplifting possibility.

That one day the same children who teased him would stand and applaud.

In December 2022, their prophesy came true.

Obligation to communicate

Between these seismic events, Upamecano underwent speech therapy, while the support of his family was constant and invaluable.

Nothing though assisted him more than playing football because out there on the grass he felt free; different. A better version of himself.

As a teenager, turning out for Vaillante Angers, a local side, he was made captain and this proved to be a turning point.

“I was obliged to communicate with my teammates. I felt good on the pitch. No one made fun of me there. I didn’t stutter when I was playing.”

His aggression in the tackle and reading of the game meanwhile saw him reimagined as a centre-back from a box-to-box midfielder. This too was a pivotal development.

Upward trajectory

In a career spanning 11 years and counting, Dayot Upamecano has excelled in Austria and proven his worth at Leipzig before cementing a reputation as one of the world’s finest centre-backs in Bavaria.

For Die Roten, he has won four Bundesliga titles, his dominant performances seeing him voted into the VDV Bundesliga Team of the Season in three of those campaigns.

In 2021, he was a key member of the French side that secured the second edition of the Nations League.

Moreover, his stock continues to rise, putting in a series of imperious displays at this summer’s World Cup that extends on another successful domestic campaign with Bayern.

With his front-foot defending and elite athleticism few get the better of him in duels but what we’re increasingly witnessing is a tactical maturity, nurtured under Vincent Kompany.

“He’s always been a leader for me, and he’s becoming more and more so,” the Manchester City legend said halfway through 2025/26. “Upa is a player who can develop into one of the best defenders in the world. There are some more steps he needs to take, and we’re taking them together.”

Reconstructing esteem

A common myth about any type of speech condition is that it derives from a lack of confidence. Rather, having a speech condition can have an adverse effect on self-esteem.

Dayot Upamecano never lacked confidence as a child, bolstered as he was by a strong family unit.

When he was just 12, he used to accompany his mother to her market stall where she sold hair products, self-appointing himself as the stall’s security, looking out for thieves. That hardly paints a picture of timidity.

When he played football as a child he was fiercely competitive and brave into every challenge.

Retrospectively, the player himself has identified his stammer as an attempt to air his thoughts too quickly, so they became muddled up.  

In due course, via patience and perseverance, he learnt to overcome this.

“I have progressed a lot,” he has said of his struggle, and his gradual bettering of an impediment that used to see him hide in plain sight, for fear of being asked to speak. Now he talks to the world’s press post-match with no shred of hesitation while globally renowned superstars on the pitch are not spared of a dressing down when required.

“Today I am proud.”