The official launch of EA Sports FC 26 is just around the corner, and some player ratings have already been revealed. In Major League Soccer, Lionel Messi leads the pack with an overall rating of 86, but Rodrigo De Paul is not the second-highest rated player in the league as many expected.
De Paul comes in at 84, while LAFC’s new star Son Heung-min takes the second spot with an 85 rating. That makes the MLS top three Messi, Son, and De Paul, with a clear gap separating them from the rest of the league.
Beyond the top three, ratings are much closer. Vancouver Whitecaps’ ThomasMuller, Inter Miami’s Sergio Busquets, and LA Galaxy’s Riqui Puig all check in at 80 overall. Just below them, Luis Suarez, Marco Reus, Evander, Emil Forsberg, Carles Gil, Denis Bouanga, and Hany Mukhtar each hold a 79 rating.
Other notable players include Jordi Alba, Hirving Lozano, and Aleksei Miranchuk at 78 overall, while Wilfried Zaha, Hugo Lloris, and Roman Bürki have been downgraded to 77. EA Sports FC 26 is set to release on September 26, with several MLS stars seeing notable drops compared to recent editions.
What about Cristiano Ronaldo?
Portuguese superstar Cristiano Ronaldo comes in with a slightly lower rating than Messi at 85 overall, but he is the highest-rated player in the Saudi Pro League. He shares that rating with notable stars like Iñigo Martinez, Karim Benzema, and N’Golo Kante.
Looking at their history in the Ultimate Team mode, these are the lowest ratings both Messi and Ronaldo have received in the video game. When they were first added in the 2010 edition, Messi had a rating of 91, while Ronaldo was at 93.
When Messi joined Inter Miami, he had a rating of 90 in the 2024 edition, which gradually declined in subsequent releases to his current 86. Ronaldo, meanwhile, started with an 86 rating upon joining Al Nassr and sees his rating drop for the first time in this edition of the game.