A few days after the Ballon d’Or was awarded to Lionel Messi, the full voting results were announced in the latest issue of France Football. Journalists from every football country were allowed to submit a top five, which ultimately resulted in a ranking. The vote has led to remarkable outcomes in certain countries, which football fans eagerly discuss and joke about on social media.
First of all: Frans van den Nieuwenhof cast his vote on behalf of the Netherlands. The journalist, who worked for Voetbal International in the past, chose a top five consisting of Cristiano Ronaldo, N’Golo Kanté, Jorginho, Kevin De Bruyne and Robert Lewandowski. His choice to ignore Lionel Messi is remarkable to say the least, as are the relatively low position for Lewandowski and the high position for Kevin De Bruyne, who missed several games this calendar year due to injuries and tried to find his form in between. However, social media mainly pokes fun at the voices from a few other countries. The journalist from Uzbekistan considered Chelsea’s Mason Mount the world’s second best player; in North Macedonia, Jorginho is at the top and Simon Kjaer in fifth place.
Ballon d’Or points numbers: Messi narrowly ahead of Lewandowski
The full Ballon d’Or ranking can be found here.
Remarkably enough, Brazil’s list contains neither Messi nor Ronaldo: the choices went to De Bruyne, Jorginho, Kylian Mbappe, Romelu Lukaku and Neymar. In the list of Cameroon, Mbappé is at one and Gianluigi Donnarumma at four; Turkmenistan also made the most of it by including players such as De Bruyne, Lautaro Martínez, Lukaku and Pedri in the top five. Yemen journalist Adel Alhababi, who compiled a top three of players of North African origin with Mohamed Salah, Karim Benzema and Riyad Mahrez, is joked that he “makes no effort to hide his bias”. Pascal Ferré, the editor-in-chief of organizer France Football, voted for Lewandowski, Messi, Benzema, Jorginho and Mbappé.
After organizer France Football compiled a shortlist of thirty players, a selection of journalists – one from each FIFA football country – decided the winner. Journalists were asked to choose a top five from the thirty shortlisted names, based on one’s individual and collective performance over the past year, quality of the player and taking into account the player’s career. The number one panelist received six points, the number two four points, the number three three points, the number four two points and the number five one point. In the end, an overall ranking followed.
