At 18-years of age, most young footballers are thinking about breaking through their respective academies and trying to force a way into the starting eleven.

A great example this season has been Dele Alli, who has shone for Spurs after completing an extremely successful loan spell back at MK Dons last year, which has obviously done him the world of good.

And in France, there is another youngster that is drawing striking similarities to Spurs’ new hot-shot, and his name is Ousmane Dembele.

Unlike Alli, Dembele is a striker for Ligue 1 outfit Rennes, but the hype around his arrival into his side’s first-team this season has been unimaginable. He broke onto the scene at the start of the season, and has since become the club’s top goalscorer in his maiden campaign.

What makes this feat more impressive is that Dembele hasn’t been a guaranteed starter for every Rennes match this season. Manager Rolland Courbis has been keen to ease the youngster into his XI, and the starlet has rewarded his manager with 12 goals in just 22 appearances.

The hype really cranked up a notch back at the start of March, when Rennes played their fierce rivals Nantes in the hotly-contested Derby Breton. The forward despatched a cool hat-trick, banging in his first goal after just 56 seconds to help his side to a riotous 4-1 victory. This was a show of epic proportions for any senior player but for a junior to grab the headlines in the way that Dembele did deserves vast praise indeed. He became the first ever Rennes player to score a hat-trick in the Breton derby, and the first to score a hat-trick since 2008 – admirable stuff. The last person his age to manage three goals in one sitting was Jeremy Menez back in 2005, and look what a superstar he has gone onto become in his native homeland.

Liverpool and Manchester United, among others, are all keeping tabs on the 18-year-old, with that performance at the heart of it all. Former Manchester United defender Mikael Silvestre is a director at the club, and his presence prove vital in resolving the future of the young forward. But it was United’s former defender that persuaded Dembele to stay after a spat that nearly saw the youngster leave.

So with so many clubs interested and the world seemingly at the Frenchman’s feet, what should he do? First-team football is always the best way to progress but the temptation of lucrative deals with some of Europe’s best could prove too much for one of the most exciting young players around.

What’s certain is that we will be seeing a lot more of Dembele, one of Frances’s most exciting prospects this decade.

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