Berlin (AFP)

If the Bundesliga does not attract the greatest players on the planet, it is a high-level laboratory for young talents who come to find time in a championship tactically and physically demanding.

Here are five players 20 years old or younger to follow this season:

Alphonso Davies: from the refugee camp at Bayern

Born on 02/11/2000, Bayern, winger.

Born in Ghana in a sixteen-year-old Canadian international refugee camp, Alphonso Davies has only had a few minutes of play with Bayern last season. Enough to score his first goal, making him the youngest player in the Bavarian club to score in the Bundesliga for twenty years.

Excellent dribbler loving to play one-on-one, Davies will first of all gain lucidity. The Canadian could be more than a joker this season after a successful preparation, reinforcing wingers Serge Gnabry, Kingsley Coman and Ivan Perisic.

Kai Havertz: Germany is waiting for him

Born on 11/06/1999, Leverkusen, offensive midfielder.

Probably the most promising player in German football. Presented as the future boss of the Mannschaft, compared to Michael Ballack or Mezut Özil, Kai Havertz has already shown at twenty the extent of his talent with twenty-four goals and nineteen assists in 88 Bundesliga matches.

With a "great intelligence of play" and an "incredible calm ball at the foot", according to Joachim Löw, the attacking midfielder is able to reverse matches on his own. "He has no football limit," said Rudi Völler, the sports director of Leverkusen, who knows it will be difficult to keep his jewel, whose market value is estimated at 100 million euros.

Ibrahima Konaté: the child who did not like football

Born on 25/05/1999, Leipzig, central defender.

"When I was little, I did not like football," he admitted last year at the magazine Onze Mondial. Hard to imagine given the rise of Ibrahima Konaté, holder last year in the best defense Bundesliga.

The French international hope is defined as a "fast" defender who "technically manages despite (s) size" (1m93 for 92kg) and "likes to make decisions". Among the five young Frenchmen of the RB squad, he appears almost already as an experienced player (already 64 matches played with Leipzig).

At the dawn of his third season with Leipzig, Konaté must confirm and assert himself in Europe with his club, qualified for the second time in its history in the Champions League.

Ozan Kabak: best hope 2018-2019

Born on 25/03/2000, Schalke 04, central defender.

Less than six months with Stuttgart were enough to make Ozan Kabak the best Bundesliga prospect last season. His bright passage of promising element to holder in the defense of five Swabian club alongside Benjamin Pavard convinced Schalke 04 to recruit him this summer for 15M.

Born on the same day as Dortmund Jadon Sancho's nugget, Kabak was trained in Galatasaray, for which he played in four Champions League matches. The Turk remains a technical defender who compensates for his relative lack of speed by a good play of the game and has already scored three goals in fifteen Bundesliga matches.

Dejan Joveljic: the fox of Serbia

Born on 7/08/1999, Frankfurt, center forward.

At Eintracht Frankfurt, one Serb can hide another. After Luka Jovic's record 60-million-euro bid to Real Madrid, the Europa League semi-finalist last year bet on his compatriot Dejan Joveljic, also trained at Red Star Belgrade.

The fox of the surfaces had already distinguished last year by scoring three goals in four matches of Youth League, the Youth Champions League and eight in 17 matches of the championship of Serbia. Right-handed but also adroit of the left foot, Joveljic is a good dribbler able to find the opening in small spaces.

© 2019 AFP