The French news outlet is famously harsh in its scoring system, but occasionally performances come along that leave them awestruck.
Joao Neves has had quite the 2025. He was an integral part of the Paris Saint-Germain team that won their first-ever Champions League, helped Portugal to Nations League glory, and perhaps the most impressive feat of all, has now been awarded a 10/10 rating by for his stunning performance against Toulouse in Ligue 1.
The French news outlet is famed for its no-nonsense approach to performance scoring. It's rare for anybody to impress them enough that a perfect mark is handed out, and it becomes quite the hot topic if they ever actually do so.
Sometimes, the mask slips and they are left with no choice but to recognise the exploits of those that put in faultless displays, with GOAL on hand to run you through the 19 players that have seen that ultimate accolade bestowed upon them:
Franck Sauzee & Bruno Martini – France U21s 3-0 Greece U21s, 1988
The first players to record perfect 10s were French starlets Sauzee and Martini. After a goalless first-leg draw with Greece in the European Under-21 Championship final, Les Bleus welcomed their opponents to Besancon and secured a famous victory.
Sauzee was instrumental, netting a fine brace, while Martini made a string of great saves to keep his side in front.
The pair would go on to have storied careers, with the former racking up over 500 league appearances and scoring 102 goals from defence and midfield. Martini would become a club legend at Auxerre and progress to senior football at international level before becoming France's goalkeeping coach.
AdvertisementOleg Salenko – Russia 6-1 Cameroon, 1994
Even the Scrooges at L'Equipe could not deprive Salenko of their highest honour after he put in a five-star performance at USA 94.
Salenko remains the only player to score five in a World Cup match, and his earlier strike against Sweden saw him share the Golden Boot with Hristo Stoichkov – despite the fact that Russia did not progress past the group stages.
Lars Windfeld – Aarhus 1-0 Nantes, 1997
Few gave Danish side Aarhus much hope when they were drawn against Nantes in the UEFA Cup first round in 1997/98.
However, in Denmark they held the favourites to a 2-2 draw and they then nicked a 1-0 victory in the second leg. Torben Piechnik got the goal, but the real hero was Windfeld, who produced an outrageous array of saves to keep the French side at bay.
Sadly, Windfeld was never capped by his country. Damn you Peter Schmeichel!
Lionel Messi – Barcelona 4-1 Arsenal, 2010
It took a ridiculous 13 years until L'Equipe felt comfortable handing out another 10/10, with a floppy-haired kid from Argentina breaking the drought.
This was one of the many times that Messi was unplayable in a huge game while the peak of his powers, and his team needed it after drawing 2-2 in the first leg at the Emirates.