Spain centre-back Pau Cubarsi has been awarded the FIFA Young Player Award for his exceptional performances at the FIFA World Cup 2026, becoming the first defender in history to claim the honour. Goalkeeper Unai Simon simultaneously claimed the Golden Glove, completing a remarkable individual double for La Roja as they lifted their second World Cup title with a 1-0 extra-time victory over Argentina in the final on Sunday at New York New Jersey Stadium.

Cubarsi's Historic Campaign

Cubarsi, aged 19, started all eight matches for Spain across the tournament, never putting a foot wrong throughout. He forged a commanding central defensive partnership with Aymeric Laporte, helping Spain concede just one goal across the entire tournament — a strike in their 2-1 quarter-final win over Belgium.

His award is historic on multiple counts. He is only the fifth teenager in history to win the World Cup, and the first defender ever to receive the Young Player Award. He joins an illustrious list of previous winners including Pelé, Franz Beckenbauer, Michael Owen, Thomas Müller, Paul Pogba, and Kylian Mbappé. As a defender, he follows in the footsteps of Beckenbauer, Władysław Żmuda, Antonio Cabrini, and Manuel Amoros — though none of those four won the award itself.

Simon Rewrites the Golden Glove Record Books

Unai Simon's World Cup 2026 was nothing short of extraordinary. The Spain goalkeeper registered seven clean sheets across the tournament — the most ever recorded by a goalkeeper in a single World Cup edition. He conceded just one goal, also in the quarter-final against Belgium.

Prior to that match, Simon had gone an astonishing 649 minutes without conceding in World Cup football, a streak dating back to Qatar 2022. Seven goalkeepers had previously managed five clean sheets in a single tournament — Jan Jongbloed (Netherlands, 1974), Walter Zenga (Italy, 1990), Claudio Taffarel (Brazil, 1994), Fabien Barthez (France, 1998), Oliver Kahn (Germany, 2002), Gianluigi Buffon (Italy, 2006), and Iker Casillas (Spain, 2010). Simon has now surpassed all of them.

Spain's Second Goalkeeper to Win the Golden Glove

Simon becomes only the second Spanish goalkeeper to win the Golden Glove, following Iker Casillas, who claimed the award at the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. The symmetry is striking — Casillas held the record for clean sheets that Simon has now broken.

What This Means for Spanish Football

Spain's FIFA World Cup 2026 triumph, built on the back of a near-impenetrable defence that conceded just once in eight matches, signals the emergence of a generational defensive core. Cubarsi's rise — from Barcelona's academy to World Cup winner and award recipient before his 20th birthday — marks one of the most accelerated trajectories in modern football. With both players at peak development age, Spain's defensive foundations look set to anchor La Roja for years to come.