Ranking the 10 best Premier League center backs for 2025

There may not be a single league in the world with as much central defensive talent as the English top flight, so here are the best Premier League center backs right now in 2025.

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10. Murillo, Nottingham Forest

Nottingham Forest are in the Champions League race this season against all odds by virtue of a defense that is so lockdown that it just might be the best in European football right now.

The center back partnership of newcomer Nikola Milenkovic, formerly of Fiorentina after a heavy courting for his services in the world of Calcio, and Murillo, with the latter already established as the starter from last season.

Murillo has been one of the best players in the entire Premier League in the 2024/25 season and at 22 years of age, we’ll be hearing his name for a long time as one of the best Premier League center backs. Hopefully, Forest can keep him for a few more years.

9. Micky van de Ven, Tottenham

The ultra athletic Micky van de Ven was on the radar of virtually every top Premier League club in remote need of a center back, but Tottenham were able to sign the Dutchman over Liverpool in a key 2023 transfer battle.

VdV, alongside new goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario, became key to Spurs returning to Champions League contention, and few center backs on this entire planet have the young man’s closing speed and ability to cover ground.

A versatile defender who has settled into the center back role in North London after a strong career in the Bundesliga, Van de Ven reads the game well and has the ball-playing ability to match the requirements of a modern center back.

8. Ruben Dias, Manchester City

One of the few defenders to win the Premier League Player of the Season award, Ruben Dias has been a smashing success and one of the best Premier League center back from the moment he left the Portuguese top flight and reached the Etihad.

Dias has been a lynchpin in multiple Premier League-winning sides under Pep Guardiola and was excellent in 2022/23 when the Citizens finally won the Champions League.

Even this season, the accomplished 27-year-old has maintained his reputation as one of the league’s top defenders despite the fact that Man City are actively imploding and at serious risk of not even reaching the Champions League next season.

7. Marc Guehi, Crystal Palace

England international Marc Guehi was one of the few players who enhanced his reputation as the Three Lions marched to the Euro 2024 Final in what was almost wholly a Jude Bellingham and defense-fueled endeavor for another Gareth Southgate-coached side that couldn’t get it done in the end.

Guehi shut down some of the best forwards in the tournament, which is pretty much what he’s been doing for years in the Premiership. Even though Crystal Palace have a new top center back in town in Maxence Lacroix to replace Joachim Andersen – and both are great contenders for this top 10 – Guehi is still going strong.

6. Cristian Romero, Tottenham

Former Juventus prospect Cristian Romero was quietly one of the best defenders in Serie A with an aggressive attacking style that was almost like a defensive midfielder at the back, as he fit Gian Piero Gasperini’s idea of a center back almost to a “t'”.

The Argentinian international was a wrecking ball, winning possession as a destroyer up the pitch before skating by midfielders and registering goals and assists to the good for La Dea.

He’s brought the carnage to the Premier League for Tottenham as arguably the team’s most important player behind Premier League legend Son Heung-min, and Spurs are simply not the same when Romero isn’t in the lineup.

Since joining the Premier League in the 2021/22 season, Romero has never averaged fewer than two tackles and one interception per game in any given season and is one of the two best central defenders in the league on the attacking end.

5. Joska Gvardiol, Manchester City

The other one of those two players is Josko Gvardiol, whose highlight reel of goals outside the box would rival that of center midfielders in the English top flight. He has proven adept as a fullback, too, but everyone knows that Gvardiol is at his best as a wide center back in a three-man defensive setup.

Gvardiol joined Manchester City in 2023 for 90 million euros, and although the fee from Red Bull was eye-watering, Man City, even amidst their struggles this season, will feel it was money well-spent while Champions League rivals like Real Madrid may live to regret not pushing harder for him.

A standout for two Croatia sides that made it to the World Cup semifinals, Gvardiol is one of the best athletes in world football when looking at his blend of strength and explosiveness, and his technical quality exceeds every other center back on this planet.

4. Gabriel Magalhaes, Arsenal

The hard-nosed Arsenal center back gets underrated because of his teammate, but Gabriel is another legitimately world-class center back who had a high pedigree in Ligue 1 before stepping up his game another notch in the English Premiership.

Gabriel has the physicality and footballing intelligence to mark any striker in this league out of the game, as he is a great equalizer for the Gunners and has been one of the best Premier League center backs for years now.

It is his consistency that makes him go underrated, but not a single soul in regular attendance underrates Gabriel. The Brazilian is a franchise player at the back and a cerebral assassin who frequently covers the blushes of his teammates at the back. And he’s not half bad as a passer either.

3. Ibrahima Konate, Liverpool

When healthy, Ibrahima Konate is as good as any center back in world football, and that’s been the story with the Frenchman ever since his days at RB Leipzig before 2019.

Jurgen Klopp plucked Konate from the German top flight just as he did Joel Matip a handful of years prior, and Konate has gone on to be at least as influential to Liverpool as the former Schalke man.

Konate was overshadowed by Dayot Upamecano as a prospect in Leipzig but has since surpassed his fellow French standout, and while he is, likewise, overshadowed by Virgil van Dijk at Anfield, there’s nothing wrong with being second best to THE best.

2. William Saliba, Arsenal

Of course, Konate is more aptly third best in the Premier League to Van Dijk and William Saliba, and Konate’s countryman has really given the Dutchman a run for his money since the start of the 2022/23 season.

With each passing month, Saliba’s reputation grows as an extremely active and quick central defender, especially as his technical ability and identification of runs off the ball improves with experience.

Saliba was the best center back in France while at Marseille, and Arsenal always knew he had the potential to be special, even when he was a prospect for Saint Etienne several years ago.

Now, Saliba is a regular in Premier League Team of the Season lists and, like Van Dijk, a player rival fanbases love to try and tear down out of sheer jealousy.

1. Virgil van Dijk, Liverpool

Thankfully, now that sane discourse can resume without the bizarre comparisons to Real Madrid legend Sergio Ramos, Virgil van Dijk can be fully appreciated as one of the best center backs in the world – not just one of the best Premier League center backs.

Van Dijk has been a wall again since the start of the 2023/24 season, proving that his struggles in 2022/23 were just as much about the team and environment as they were about him.

Liverpool are back in the driver’s seat in English football as title favorites, and Van Dijk has been arguably the MVP of the entire league after attacking teammate Mohamed Salah.

Although his nonchalance can often be his downfall in the counterattack, there isn’t a center back you’d rather have leading your line, marking a top striker, covering one-on-ones, or building up play from the back than Van Dijk, who is one of the smartest central defenders we’ve seen in the modern game.