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Manchester United won nothing last season. Their captain has just been voted the best player in the league by the people he plays against.
Bruno Fernandes and Manchester City's Khadija Shaw have taken the PFA men's and women's player of the year awards, completing a double for both. They had already been named the Football Writers' Association footballers of the year for 2025-26.
Twenty-one assists, and a record that had stood a while
Kevin De Bruyne and Thierry Henry had shared the Premier League single-season assist record at 20. Fernandes made it 21, and did it on the final day at Brighton, setting up United's opener before scoring their third himself.
Nine goals and 21 assists in 35 league games. Twenty-two assists in 37 matches across all competitions. The next best provider in the division was City's Rayan Cherki, on 12, which is the sort of gap that ends an argument before it starts. United finished third and got back into the Champions League largely because of it.
He is 31 now, six and a half years on from arriving from Sporting Lisbon in January 2020. No United player had won this since Wayne Rooney in 2010. He is also only the second Portuguese winner, after Cristiano Ronaldo took it in 2007 and 2008.
The shortlist was not soft either: Gabriel Magalhaes, David Raya and Declan Rice from champions Arsenal, plus Cherki and Erling Haaland.
Shaw keeps rewriting the WSL record book
Twenty-one goals in 22 appearances. Four against Aston Villa, a hat-trick against Tottenham, two against West Ham on the final day to take City to the title. She is the first player to score 20 or more in three separate WSL seasons and the first to win three golden boots, which puts her clear of Vivianne Miedema and Sam Kerr.
Then there was the FA Cup: five more goals, including the opener in the final. The 29-year-old Jamaica international now joins Lucy Bronze and Fran Kirby as the only multiple winners of the women's award, having done the PFA and FWA double once before after 2023-24.
The young player awards
Nico O'Reilly took the men's young player prize from Morgan Rogers. The 21-year-old made himself undroppable at City across 34 league games and was named man of the match when they beat Arsenal in the League Cup final.
Arsenal's Olivia Smith kept hers. Only Lauren Hemp had won the women's young player award more than once before now. Smith, 22 and Canadian, scored 10 in all competitions in her first season at the Emirates after a £1m move from Liverpool.
Team of the year
Arsenal and City took nine of the eleven places between them. Arsenal conceded 27 goals all season, which explains the block of Raya, Jurrien Timber, William Saliba and Gabriel, with Rice in front of them.
Premier League team of the year: David Raya (Arsenal); Jurrien Timber (Arsenal), William Saliba (Arsenal), Gabriel Magalhaes (Arsenal), Nico O'Reilly (Man City); Bruno Fernandes (Man United), Declan Rice (Arsenal), Rayan Cherki (Man City); Antoine Semenyo (Man City), Erling Haaland (Man City), Igor Thiago (Brentford).
WSL team of the year: Hannah Hampton (Chelsea); Kerstin Casparij (Man City), Toko Koga (Tottenham), Ellie Carpenter (Chelsea), Emily Fox (Arsenal); Yui Hasegawa (Man City), Mariona Caldentey (Arsenal), Jess Park (Man United); Bunny Shaw (Man City), Alessia Russo (Arsenal), Lauren James (Chelsea).
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