Who was the best player of the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup?

Whilst Chelsea’s Cole Palmer came away with the Golden Ball, there are quite a few worthy candidates. There was Real Madrid’s Gonzalo Garcia, who stepped into the void of Kylian Mbappe and Endrick and went from academy football to finishing as the top scorer of the tournament alongside Angel Di Maria, Marcos Leonardo and Serhou Guirassy. There was PSG’s Desire Doue, who claimed the Best Young Player award after guiding Les Parisiens to the final, and Chelsea’s Robert Sanchez, whose stellar displays in goal earned him the Golden Glove.

However, there’s absolutely no doubt about who was the most relatable player from the tournament: Auckland City’s Christian Gray. After all, out of the 130 players who scored in the month-long tournament in the United States, Gray was the only one who wasn’t a professional footballer, but an amateur.

"It was really cool traveling to the United States,” stated Gray in an exclusive Joy News interview. “We played in three different cities and probably ticked off eight different cities, as we went over two weeks before the first game and got to see the tourist destinations, and cover a few different cities, places that maybe we wouldn't otherwise have gone, so that's been a cool part of it.”

Born in the Gisborne Region of New Zealand, Gray was raised by two sporting legends in Sandra Edge, who won the gold, silver and bronze medals at the World Netball Championships in 1987, 1991, and 1995, and Rodger Gray, who captained New Zealand’s football team and scored four goals in 39 caps between 1989 and 1997 and played for Mt Wellington, Waitakere City F.C., and Waitemata FC. Whilst Christian hasn’t been able to replicate his father’s feat of playing for the national team, he’s nevertheless followed in his footsteps as a center back, starting off at Wellington College before launching his senior career with Waitakere United in 2016. Gray bounced around from Waitakere United to Hamilton Wanderers to Birkenhead United to Eastern Suburbs before eventually making the move to Auckland City on January 1, 2022. Today, he spends his time driving around Auckland and balancing his playing ambitions with his teaching responsibilities. 

"I teach PE to students between the ages of 13 and 18 at a secondary school, and the first 11, which is the premier football team made up of kids from 15 to 18, but this is my first year of teaching health and PE. I've been with the school's football team for the last 3 years; it started off coaching football, and then this year I started teaching PE. We teach health to the juniors at school, explaining to them why sleep is important, why good nutrition and exercise are important, and other healthy habits. I've had a lot of good experiences this year that can be useful to youngsters in sport as well as life lessons, and I think these experiences will make me a better teacher. That’s the beauty of sport, travel, and what we have achieved.”

Unlike the only two professional teams in New Zealand – Auckland FC and Wellington Phoenix – who play in the Australian league and are thus banned from competing in Oceania and Asia continental competitions. As such, Auckland City have been able to form a stranglehold at the domestic and regional level, winning 10 New Zealand Football Championships, including last year’s edition, as well as a whopping 13 OFC Champions League titles, including the last four. Similarly to Florentino Perez’s Real Madrid in the UEFA Champions League, Nasser Al-Khelaifi’s Paris Saint-Germain in Ligue 1, and Sergey Palkin’s Shakhtar Donetsk in the Ukrainian Premier League, Auckland have staked out a dynasty in Oceania and New Zealand.

As a result, they have played in more FIFA Club World Cups (12) than any other team in world football, winning a bronze medal in 2014 before losing their next eight matches in the competition. Despite not earning any money from his playing exploits, Gray has been able to channel his footballing dreams into reality, traveling across the world and representing his club against the biggest teams and stars in the game. He’s gone up against the likes of Karim Benzema, N’Golo Kante, Fabinho, Angel Di Maria and Edinson Cavani, and represented his club and his city of Auckland in Asia, North America, and Africa.

“I've got a lot of family in Auckland. Most of my dad's family and my grandmother have recently moved, so I’m currently in between houses at my grandmother's, and my uncle and auntie are next door, so it’s a little bit of a family-like compound.”

As Oceania’s sole representatives in the 32-team tournament, Auckland fell to a 10-0 defeat to Bayern Munich and a 6-0 defeat to Benfica before taking on Argentine giants Boca Juniors. Unlike Auckland, who were already eliminated, Boca were fighting to stay alive in the tournament after grabbing a point vs. Benfica, and they looked on course for a beatdown after taking the lead via an own goal. However, the New Zealanders would survive the first half with a manageable deficit, and shortly after, they equalized as Gray headed home from a corner kick. Auckland would go on to hold on for a historic 1-1 stalemate, breaking the hearts of millions of Boca Juniors supporters like Nico Cantor and putting an end to Auckland’s decade-long losing streak in the Club World Cup. And whereas the Boca players have returned to Argentina, where they are making a fortune as representatives of one of the biggest teams in the world, Gray returned to New Zealand without seeing any of the $4.58 million that Auckland reportedly earned across the tournament.

“We’ve committed a lot to this football club, and even though it’s been a great opportunity for us, and we're privileged to be able to go to these tournaments, we haven't seen much, if any, financial reward for the past four years, but to know that the club has earned a lot from this tournament is rewarding.  We don't necessarily play for the money, even though it would help. We’ve got a good core group of boys that has been together for four years, and we play for the love of the game. We also get the opportunity to go to these tournaments and play on the world stage, which is also a bonus, and I guess that's what we also play for. But we know, as amateurs, it's not all about money.”

Gray spent two months back in his homeland before flying out to Egypt to face off against Pyramids in the FIFA Intercontinental Cup, where they lost 3-0. Since then, Auckland have lost 3-0 at Birkenhead United, followed by wins vs. Western Suburbs and Wellington Olympic. Back-to-back stalemates followed before they prevailed with a 4-2 win vs. Auckland United, only to lose 3-0 at Miramar Rangers. Auckland will return to action vs. Wellington Phoenix’s Reserves before taking on Western Springs AFC and Coastal Spirit, and they’ll be counting on Gray, who, despite balancing his football career with a demanding schedule, has found a way to thrive.

“I get up just after 5 a.m. and then start coaching my school’s team just before 6:30, and then I’ll coach until just after 8. I’ll then teach PE and health from 8:30 to 3:30, and then I’ve got a little gap between school and training. I'll do what I’ve got to do between 3:30 and 5 and then do training (3-4 times a week depending on whether the game’s on Saturday or Sunday). Any time I get during the school day, or on the weekend, I’ll squeeze in my online classes and lectures for university.”

Auckland City currently sit sixth in the table, level on 11 points with Christchurch United and one point behind Auckland FC’s reserves (with a game in hand on both). They also sit two points behind Miramar Rangers, four behind Wellington Olympic, and five behind league leaders Western Springs AFC. The top two teams will face off in a championship match to determine the winner of the New Zealand National League.