The 2010s have been a hugely eventful decade in the world of football.

We’ve seen Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo (arguably the two greatest footballers of all time) battle it out for supremacy; clubs like Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain become powerhouses of European football; Zinedine Zidane become a manager and lead Real Madrid to an unprecedented three consecutive Champions League titles; we’ve also seen the steady demise of Manchester United following the retirement of Sir Alex Ferguson and, well, so much more that we could be here all day.

But what do the 2020s have in store for all us football fans?

Well, YouTuber ‘The Irish Guy’, who does videos for HITC Sport, recently decided to list 40 things (the video says 50 for some reason, but it’s actually 40) that ‘WILL HAPPEN’ before 2030.

Let’s take a look at these predictions in more detail…

1. Kylian Mbappe will become the first £300m player

Surely inevitable. Ronaldo was the most expensive player at the end of the 2000s after completing his £80 million move from Man Utd to Real Madrid.

The record now stands at £198 million (set by Neymar, who left Barcelona for PSG in 2017) and as transfer fees continue to balloon, it would take at least £300 million to prise Mbappe away from the Parc des Princes.

Chance of happening: 9.5/10

2. Neymar will become first £1m-a-week player

Gareth Bale almost became the first £1m-a-week player in the summer before Madrid blocked his move to China.

Neymar certainly has a chance of becoming the first £1m-a-week player, but he is 28 in February, so don’t be surprised if another world-class footballer ends up taking this particular title.


Chance of happening: 7/10

3. Man Utd will win the Premier League

If Man Utd reach 2030 without winning the Premier League title, their drought will have entered a 17th year, which seems crazy.

As The Irish Guy says, United are spending too much money not to be successful again at some point over the next 10 years.

Chance of happening: 8/10

4. Juventus will win a Champions League

Juventus haven’t won a Champions League since 1996 but currently have a squad capable of seriously challenging this season.

If they don’t do it within the next year or two, though, their wait for the European Cup might stretch beyond 2030.

Chance of happening: 6.5/10

5. Marcus Rashford will end up washed up at 30

Rashford has already played 182 games for Man Utd and another 36 for England and he hasn’t even turned 22 yet.

But… the striker is a great professional who keeps himself in top physical condition. Because of his attitude alone, it’s hard to agree that he’ll be finished by the age of 30.

Chance of happening: 3/10

6. Ronaldo’s son will win the Golden Boy award

Cristiano Ronaldo Jr. certainly looks a talent but it’s so early to tell whether he’ll become a professional footballer, let alone a Golden Boy award winner.

The nine-year-old is currently on the books of Juventus, so is on the right path, but expecting him to win the Golden Boy award might be a tad optimistic.

Chance of happening: 2.5/10

7. Mike Ashley will sell Newcastle

“I think I could own this club forever.”

These were the haunting words of Ashley himself earlier this year, so we wouldn’t like to get Newcastle fans’ hopes up by claiming the chances of him selling up are especially high.

Chance of happening: 3/10

8. Bournemouth will go back to League One

If Bournemouth are relegated between now and the late 2020s (which is certainly a real possibility, especially if they lose Eddie Howe), then it wouldn’t be a shock to see them fall back down to League One by 2030.

Chance of happening: 6.5/10

9. Wolves will reach a Europa League final

Why not? It might even happen this season.

Chance of happening: 7/10

10. Rangers will win the league

Steven Gerrard has made Rangers competitive again and it seems a matter of time before they beat Celtic to their first Scottish Premiership title since 2011.

Chance of happening: 9/10

11. Rhian Brewster will be a £100m player

The lad is 19 years old now and not really playing enough competitive football to suggest that he’ll become a £100 million player one day.

That said, the England Under-21 international is clearly a major talent. He just needs to force his way into Liverpool’s first team.

Chance of happening: 4.5/10

12. Saido Berahino will retire in shame

This one feels overly harsh. The 26-year-old’s career hasn’t gone to plan but we hope he can get his career back on track with Zulte Waregem in Belgium.

Chance of happening: N/A

13. Phil Foden will captain England

Foden is an extraordinary talent - the best young player Pep Guardiola has ever seen, apparently - and he certainly has all the tools to become a key player for Man City and England.

Chance of happening: 8/10

14. Wayne Rooney will manage a Premier League club

Rooney is about to join Derby as a player-coach, so he clearly has aspirations of becoming a manager.

We’d love to see old Wazza managing in the Premier League.

Chance of happening: 7.5/10

15. Jack Grealish will never play for England

Nah, he will. Grealish is playing well for Villa right now and a call-up to the England national team seems likely ahead of Euro 2020.

Chance of happening: 0.5/10

16. Gay footballer will come out in the Premier League

We’re surely getting closer to a Premier League footballer revealing he’s gay. We’re in 2019 not 1979.

Chance of happening: 8/10

17. Theo Walcott will become a pundit

Yes. We can definitely see this happening.

Walcott is well-spoken, articulate and always comes across very well in interviews. A post-playing career in punditry awaits.

Chance of happening: 9.5/10

18. Jose Mourinho will win the World Cup with Portugal

Mourinho is certainly getting closer to taking an international job and it would be great to see him managing the Portuguese national team.

But to expect him to win the World Cup with his home country, who have never been world champions, is a massive ask.

Chance of happening: 1.5/10

19. Steve Bruce will never coach in the Premier League again

Yeah, if Bruce loses his job at Newcastle it would be hard to see him getting another Premier League job in the future.

That said, he’s only 58 and has bags of experience so he’ll always be in the frame for a few top-flight vacancies.

Chance of happening: 6/10

20. Javi Gracia will be sacked by Christmas

It’s already happened! On the day the video was posted, Gracia was sacked by Watford and replaced with Quique Sanchez Flores.

Chance of happening: It’s happened.

21. Man City will win the Champions League

City are the favourites to win this season’s Champions League and certainly have a squad and manager capable of making it happen.

If they don’t win it this year, they surely will within the next couple of seasons.

Chance of happening: 9/10

22. Leeds will get promoted

They’re getting closer to returning to the top flight and Marcelo Bielsa might be the man to make it happen.

Chance of happening: 9/10

23. England will win the World Cup (Not)

The Irish Guy had a cheeky dig at England here, saying they’ll win the World Cup before laughing manically. He doesn’t think they’ll become world champions again before 2030 and he’s probably right.

Chance of happening (England not winning the World Cup): 9/10

24. Lincoln City will reach the Premier League

Lincoln are currently 15th in League One and have never played in the Premier League before.

This seems an odd prediction to us, but who knows…

Chance of happening: 2/10

25. Salford City will reach the Championship

Salford have enjoyed a meteoric rise up English football’s pyramid since the Class of ’92 came onboard and will continue to improve over the coming years.

Reaching the Championship won’t be easy but there’s a reasonable chance it’ll happen.

Chance of happening: 7.5/10

26. Paul Pogba will sign for an MLS club

The Irish Guy reckons that Pogba loves attention like David Beckham, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Thierry Henry and will end up signing for a Major League Soccer club within the next 10 years.

We can also see it happening.

Chance of happening: 8.5/10

27. Cristiano Ronaldo will become a movie star

"I want to try other things; for example, to do movies. I started to plan my future when I was 27, 28 - a long time ago, I began preparing.”

Ronaldo admitted this himself in 2018, so it’ll probably happen.

The next James Bond, anyone?

Chance of happening: 9.5/10

28. We will never hear from Bobby Duncan again

He may have annoyed Liverpool fans by moving to Fiorentina in the summer but the 18-year-old, who was recently promoted to England’s Under-19 squad, is a big talent.

If he’s anything like his famous cousin, Steven Gerrard, we’ll be hearing plenty about Bobby Duncan between now and 2030.

Chance of happening: 2/10

29. Vinicius Junior will sign for Man City

Vinicius’s career has stalled a little this season but the Brazilian teenager is an exceptional young player.

Whether he eventually ends up signing for Man City, though, is anybody’s guess.

Chance of happening: 5/10

30. Steven Gerrard will win the Premier League with Liverpool

Gerrard will probably end up managing Liverpool one day but the odds of him both taking over at Anfield and then winning the Premier League by 2030 must be fairly slim.

Chance of happening: 2.5/10

31. Arsenal will win the league

Arsenal must appoint a genuinely top manager and bring in several players of serious quality in order to end their long wait for a Premier League title.

Chance of happening: 6/10

32. Ivory Coast will win AFCON on pens after goalless final

This is a very specific prediction - although the Ivory Coast have reached the African Cup of Nations final on four occasions and it ended in a penalty shoot-out all four times.

Will it happen for a fifth time before 2030?

Chance of happening: 2.5/10

33. Jamie Vardy will play for Sheffield Wednesday

Vardy seems to be getting better with age, so there’s a chance he’ll see out the remainder of his career with Leicester.

However, the 32-year-old does support Sheffield Wednesday, so it would be quite nice if he ended his career at Hillsborough.

Chance of happening: 9.5/10

34. Sergio Aguero to be in top two of PL goalscoring charts

Aguero has 172 Premier League goals and is 31 years old. Rooney is in second place with 208 goals.

Unless he ends up leaving England within the next two years, the Argentine should definitely surpass Rooney’s tally.

Chance of happening: 9.5/10

35. Harry Kane will not break Alan Shearer’s record

Kane is 26 and has 130 goals - exactly half the 260 goals that Shearer banged in during his time in the Premier League.

Tottenham’s main man has a real chance of breaking it, unless he decides to move abroad.

Chance of happening: 6.5/10

36. Jurgen Klopp will manage Bayern Munich

“I do not know (about managing Bayern). There’s a long way to go,” Klopp said in an interview earlier this year.

“Basically, football is like this: The opportunity has to be right, and the timing has to be right.”

Would Klopp ruin his legacy in the eyes of the Borussia Dortmund fans? We can’t see it, personally.

Chance of happening: 2/10

37. Raheem Sterling will win the Ballon d’Or

It’s very difficult to win a Ballon d’Or but Sterling has a decent chance.

Once Ronaldo and Messi begin to decline, Sterling is one of several players who could potentially win the prestigious individual accolade.

Chance of happening: 6/10

38. Sergio Ramos will manage Real Madrid

Ramos and Gerard Pique going head-to-head in a Clasico? We’d all love to see it.

Chance of happening: 7/10

39. Ravel Morrison will end up stacking shelves aged 30

Like the Berahino prediction, this feels unnecessary and harsh.

We hope Morrison, who currently plays for Sheffield United, proves his doubters wrong over the coming months.

Chance of happening: N/A

40. Pep Guardiola will finally be sacked

Most managers get sacked at some point - but it’s hard to imagine a football club owner wielding the axe on Guardiola.

Chance of happening: 2/10