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Alphonso Davies: The Bayern Munich and Canada star's top 5 career moments so far...

20.02.2024

Alphonso Davies became the youngest Bayern Munich player in history to reach 100 Bundesliga appearances during the 2022/23 season, marking another notable career milestone for the Canadian - bundesliga.com attempts to pick five of the best of them...

1) World Cup history

Davies hadn't even been born when Canada bowed out of the 1986 World Cup after losing all three of their Group C encounters to nil. Thirty-six years on, aged just 22, Davies broke his country's duck. Having missed a penalty in Canada's 2022 tournament opener against Belgium, the Bayern man scored 68 seconds into the meeting with Croatia. It was his 13th goal in 36 senior international outings, and Canada's first at a finals.

2) Ruining Semedo, breaking the internet

Enduring images are par for the course for Davies. His audacious run and assist in Bayern's 2019/20 UEFA Champions League quarter-final against Barcelona is among the best of them. The Canadian - 19 at the time - outfoxed Lionel Messi and Arturo Vidal before humiliating Nelson Semedo and teeing up Joshua Kimmich for Bayern's fourth goal in a crushing 8-2 win. The assist broke the internet, while Davies went on to become the first Canadian to lift the Champions League, the same year Bayern got their hands on the Bundesliga, DFB Cup, Supercup, UEFA Super Cup and FIFA Club World Cup.

3) Bayern breakthrough - as a left-back

Remarkably, that was Davies' first full season in Bayern colours. The Canadian had only joined the record champions in January 2019, making his Bundesliga debut against VfB Stuttgart later that month, but was already a first-team regular by the end of the calendar year. Rapid progress by anyone's standards, not least in the context of his conversion from prodigious attacking winger upon arrival in the Bavarian capital to world's best left-back. All but 17 of his 144 competitive appearances for Bayern up until his Bundesliga ton in Stuttgart were on the left-hand side of defence.

Watch: Alphonso Davies under the tactical microscope

4) United Bid

A Bayern staple, Davies played an integral role in getting Canada to the 2022 World Cup. He produced five goals and eight assists across his 13 appearances in qualifying as the Canucks topped the CONCACAF section ahead of Mexico, the USMNT and Costa Rica. His efforts just a few years earlier also ensured Canada will be back at the party in 2026 - as co-hosts.

Speaking at a FIFA Congress on behalf of North America's 'United bid', a 17-year-old Davies explained how Canada had welcomed him and his family as they sought refuge from Liberia's bloody civil war; a journey that took him from a refugee camp in Ghana, via Edmonton, to a career in the professional game.

"He is what this bid was all about - being united," said Peter Montopoli, General Secretary of Soccer Canada, after the 2026 World Cup was awarded to Canada, Mexico and the USA.

5) MLS beginnings

Davies' historic ride as a footballer began at Vancouver Whitecaps. Having joined the Whitecaps Residency programme's U16 team at 14, he soon became the youngest player to appear in the United Soccer League, and the first born in the 2000s to play in Major League Soccer - aged just 15 years, eight months and 15 days. All told, he turned out 65 times in MLS, tallying eight goals and 12 assists. When he left for Bayern, he did so as the most expensive MLS export in history.