Kevin De Bruyne

Belgium · Premier League · MF · BEL · age 35

Kevin De Bruyne during the national anthem before Belgium vs USMNT, March 2026.
Photo Bryan Berlin / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0

The last dance

The trophy Belgium's golden generation never lifted

Kevin De Bruyne has been the best midfielder of his generation for the better part of a decade. Six Premier League titles at Manchester City, two assists records, a career that reshaped how people thought about the position. He moved to Napoli in search of one more challenge, and at 35, he is still creating chances at a rate most players half his age cannot match.

Belgium is the part that hurts. Third place in 2018 felt like the start of something. Instead it was the summit. The 2022 group-stage exit, the dressing-room fallout, the slow unravelling of a squad that was ranked No. 1 in the world for years without a trophy to show for it. De Bruyne, Lukaku, Courtois, Hazard, Tielemans: a generation that won everything at club level and nothing together.

He turns 35 this month. Lukaku is 33, Courtois is 34. This is almost certainly Belgium's last World Cup as a group, and De Bruyne knows it. The question is not whether he is good enough. It is whether one tournament, at the end of a long road, can give a golden generation the ending it never found.

2026 World Cup squad profile

Position
MF
Squad role
Projected starter
Position rank
#1
Intl caps
117
Intl goals
36
Intl assists
53
0.84(model rating, 0–1)
30.6%

See Kevin De Bruyne on the full Belgium scoring list →

Recent form

Steady

2024/25 club form vs the player's multi-season baseline (0.38 vs 0.38).

Major tournament stats

TournamentMPMinGAxGShKPPrgPPrgCTklInt
Euro 20244379100.91110524510
World Cup 20223283000.278353211
Euro 20204284120.3511334010
World Cup 20186566120.61219908976
All tournaments171,512341.93548210206107
Event data from StatsBomb open data, covering the World Cup, Euro, Copa América and AFCON finals. Small per-tournament samples. Totals shown, not per-90 rates.
▸How to read this table— 11 columns explained
MP
Matches played in the tournament.
Min
Total minutes on the pitch.
G
Goals scored (penalties in normal play included; shootouts excluded).
A
Assists: passes that directly led to a goal.
xG
Expected goals: summed per-shot quality (StatsBomb's model).
Sh
Shots taken.
KP
Key passes: passes that led to a shot.
PrgP
Progressive passes: completed passes moving the ball ≥10m toward goal.
PrgC
Progressive carries: carries advancing ≥5m toward goal.
Tkl
Tackles won.
Int
Interceptions.

Tournament scouting radar

Defending

Tackles won / 90
0.60
23
Interceptions / 90
0.42
15
Ball recoveries / 90
5.00
75
Blocks / 90
1.19
23
Clearances / 90
0.48
30
Pressures / 90
17.44
61

Passing & progression

Prog. passes / 90
12.50
80
Key passes / 90
2.86
100
Prog. carries / 90
12.26
91
Pass completion %
75.9%
18

Possession

Carries / 90
46.01
76
Dribbles / 90
1.43
83

Per-90 rates from major-tournament event data (StatsBomb), ranked vs 102 midfielders with ≥270 minutes in the same finals. Higher = better.

307
Career matches
24,587
Career minutes
83
Goals
129
Assists
31.7
xG

Career percentiles

Goals / 90
0.30
91
xG / 90
0.12
81
xAG / 90
0.22
99

vs 355 MF players with ≥3,000 career minutes in the dataset. Higher = better.

Career: goals & xG by season

GoalsxG
Career goals and xG by season, 13 seasons from 2012-13 to 2022-23, 83 total goals, 31.7 total xG.Career goals and xG by season, 13 seasons from 2012-13 to 2022-23, 83 total goals, 31.7 total xG.048111513141415161617181920212223

Season-by-season

SeasonClubLeagueGoalsAssists
2012-13Werder BremenBundesliga332,965109——
2013-14ChelseaPremier League313101——
2013-14WolfsburgBundesliga161,41336——
2014-15WolfsburgBundesliga343,0471020——
2015-16Manchester CityPremier League252,00279——
2015-16WolfsburgBundesliga216400——
2016-17Manchester CityPremier League362,877617——
2017-18Manchester CityPremier League373,0738165.111.1
2018-19Manchester CityPremier League19975221.45.7
2019-20Manchester CityPremier League352,79113207.320.0
2020-21Manchester CityPremier League251,9976129.38.0
2021-22Manchester CityPremier League302,2011586.210.3
2022-23Manchester CityPremier League12951392.45.4
FBref data ≤ 2022-23. Rows tagged wiki are top-scorer entries from Wikipedia and only carry goals.
▸How to read this table— 6 columns explained
MP
Matches played in that season (start or sub counts as one).
Mins
Total minutes on the pitch — better signal for workload than MP alone.
Goals
Goals scored (penalties included).
Assists
Passes that directly led to a goal (FBref attribution).
xG
Expected goals — per-shot quality scored 0–1 by distance / angle / pressure, summed across the season.
xAG
Expected assisted goals — the xG of shots created by this player's passes, summed.
FBref data ends 2022-23; current-season rows tagged wiki come from Wikipedia top-scorer tables and carry only goals.

Rest of the Belgium squad