Andoni Iraola wants Antoine Semenyo to stay at Bournemouth amid interest

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Bournemouth boss Andoni Iraola admitted he does not want to lose Antoine Semenyo following speculation about his future.

The forward has been linked with several clubs, but Iraola reaffirmed that Semenyo is still a Bournemouth player despite the "noise" surrounding him.

"Antoine Semenyo right now is with us. He has trained today with us, very well," Iraola said.

"I understand that there is a lot of noise around Antoine. But my concern is that it doesn't affect him, his performances and we are seeing that it is not affecting his performances.

"He is very committed to the team and I hope we can keep him there. There are situations that we cannot control, but right now, Antoine is our player and he's going to continue playing for us.

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"If you ask me, I don't want to lose him, definitely don't want to lose him. But like we always say, every time the market opens, you never know what's going to happen."

Semenyo has been key for Bournemouth this season, scoring eight goals in 16 league games and has struck in their last two outings.

Speaking ahead of Saturday's clash with Brentford, Iraola added: "Antoine, for me, has been performing very well. Not just the last two games because he has scored. The level of consistency has been very good since the beginning of the season.

"He has had moments where he hasn't scored and has still been very valuable for us. At the end, we demand not only the numbers, but he gives us a lot of things. It's no secret he is a massive player for us."

It's that time of year again: Let's look at the past 12 months in women's soccer and pick the best of the best. It's now our fifth year of polling experts and putting together a list of the top 50 players in the world for ESPN FC Women's Rank, and it only gets more competitive each year.

The list this year reflects how much the landscape in the sport keeps changing. Fourteen players made their debuts on our top 50, seven have landed back on the list after missing out last year, and the race for the top spot was probably closer than you think.

The marquee event of the past year was the UEFA Women's Euro in Switzerland, which set new attendance records and the most goals ever scored for the tournament. It served up a thrilling rematch of the 2023 World Cup final between England and Spain, only this time it was England who came out on top after going to penalty kicks.

The UEFA Champions League trophy earlier this year was finally wrestled from powerhouses Barcelona and Lyonnes, who have combined to win the nine prior European titles. Instead, Arsenal were the surprise winners, marking the first Champions League win for an English team since 2007. (The 2025-26 UWCL season is underway in the league phase, and again Barcelona and Lyonnes are being chased.)

In the U.S., Gotham FC repeated as NWSL champions as the landscape around the American league expanded. The USL Super League completed its inaugural season with Tampa Bay Sun FC becoming the league's first champion, and north of the border the Northern Super League made its debut.

The women's game is rapidly growing, which made narrowing down ESPN FC Women's Rank to 50 names harder than ever before, even after the absences of players from last year's ranking cleared some space. Notably absent this year: Naomi Girma (No. 2 last year; injured most of this year), Sophia Wilson (No. 5 last year; pregnant this year), Lauren James (No. 10 last year; injured much of this year); and Mallory Swanson (No. 15 last year, pregnant this year).

Twenty-five current and former coaches for top-tier clubs or national teams, general managers, analysts and journalists were asked to anonymously pick their top 50 players of 2025. In all, 198 different players earned votes, and this is the final top 50.