Picking the outright brightest star is never easy, and sometimes blinding.

The final shortlist for #SOTW included …

Kylian Mbappe Lottin (Monaco** – Toulouse) {French Ligue 1} – for scoring the winning goal for AS Monaco to keep their grip on the French league title. And with their closest competition suffering defeat, Monaco is looking to run away with the title because of this victory.

Luis Suarez (Espanyol – Barcelona**) {Spanish La Liga} – for ending a goal drought and giving Barcelona the winning goal in the Catalan Derby. It was also a victory that allowed Barcelona to keep the pressure on Real Madrid.

Robert Lewandowski (Wolfsburg – Bayern Munich**) {German Bundesliga}  – for scoring to climb to the top of the goal scoring list in the German Bundesliga for the 2016/17 season while contributing two goals as Bayern Munich clinched their fifth consecutive German Bundesliga title.

Benjamin Hubner (Hoffenheim** – Frankfurt) {German Bundesliga} – grabbing a late goal for Hoffenheim to take advantage of Borussia Dortmund’s failure to get a win at home against FC Koln.  This victory moves Hoffenheim in the position to have a direct qualification to the 2017/18 UEFA Champions League.

But the SOTW will have to go to

Marcelo

(Real Madrid** – Valencia)  {Spanish La Liga)

For scoring a late winning goal to keep Real Madrid in the driving seat for the Spanish title race. With Barcelona on their heels, Madrid couldn’t afford to give a crack of hope to the chasing pack.

**The player’s team.