<\/p>\nThe favourites to win the Ballon d’Or<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Four players have emerged as the leading contenders from the 30-man shortlist for the men’s award: Yamal, Mbapp\u00e9, Kane and Messi. They are competing for the trophy won by Ousmane Demb\u00e9l\u00e9 last year.Yamal, who was named the best young player in each of the past two years, is well placed to win his first Ballon d’Or after helping Spain win the World Cup and Barcelona claim the Spanish title.Mbapp\u00e9, meanwhile, was expected to establish himself as the world’s best player long before now. He won the World Cup with France in 2018 at the age of 19, but his position in the Ballon d’Or rankings has slipped in recent years. He finished seventh last year.The French forward had an outstanding individual season last term and also became the highest scorer in World Cup history. However, his inability to lead Real Madrid or France to trophies could count against him in the voting.Kane’s case is different. The England captain has broken goalscoring records in Germany while winning titles with Bayern Munich. He was also among the leading performers at the World Cup, where England finished third.<\/p>\nMessi refuses to leave the conversation<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Many expected Messi to fade from the Ballon d’Or race after moving to Major League Soccer (MLS) to play for Inter Miami. However, the Argentine, widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, has continued to make his presence felt.He guided Miami to their first MLS Cup last season before producing another impressive World Cup campaign with Argentina. Messi helped his country come within one win of securing back-to-back World Cup titles.Argentina eventually lost the final to Spain, but Messi once again played a major role in the tournament.<\/p>\nPutellas favourite to reclaim the women’s award<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Putellas is the favourite to win the women’s Ballon d’Or after returning to her best form and helping Barcelona win the Champions League and Spanish title before joining London City Lionesses.The Spain international suffered ligament damage in the past, during which time Bonmati rose to become the leading name in women’s football. Putellas now has the chance to return to the top by winning the award for a third time, although Bonmati’s absence due to injury means she will not face the three-time defending champion.Other leading contenders include Manchester City forward Khadija Shaw and Barcelona’s Claudia Pina.<\/p>\nHow is the Ballon d’Or decided?<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
The Ballon d’Or winner is determined by a vote, with one journalist from each of the top 100 nations in the FIFA rankings taking part.The criteria include individual and team performances, \u201cdecisive and impressive character\u201d and \u201cclass and fair play.\u201dEach journalist selects 10 players from the 30 nominees and ranks them in order. The first choice receives 15 points, while the 10th receives one point. The player with the highest total wins the Ballon d’Or.If players finish level on points, the winner is decided by the number of first-place votes. If the tie remains, second-place votes are considered, followed by the subsequent positions.<\/p>\nKane’s recent form will not count towards the award<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Kane has continued to score at an impressive rate, with records falling along the way.Last month, he became the fastest player to score 100 Bundesliga goals, reaching the milestone in just 98 appearances.His form at the start of the season has strengthened his case for the Ballon d’Or. However, there is one important limitation: the voting period ended after the World Cup. The official period ran from August 3, 2025, to July 19, 2026.Kane’s performances and trophies during that period have already made him a serious contender. Had the opening weeks of the current campaign also been included, his case for being named the world’s best player would have been even stronger.<\/p>\nPlayers with the most Ballon d’Or wins<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Messi holds the record with eight Ballon d’Or titles, the most recent of which came in 2023. Ronaldo is second with five wins, having last claimed the award in 2017.Michel Platini, Johan Cruyff and Marco van Basten have won the trophy three times each.<\/div>\n
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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lionel Messi attends the 67th Ballon D’Or Ceremony at Theatre Du Chatelet on October 30, 2023 in Paris, France. The Ballon d’Or winners will be announced on Monday, with a new generation of football stars, led by Lamine Yamal and Kylian Mbapp\u00e9, hoping to win the award that was dominated for years by Lionel Messi…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":57370,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=57369"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57369\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/57370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=57369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=57369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saharanews.in\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=57369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Ballon](\"https:\/\/static.toiimg.com\/thumb\/msid-135210806,imgsize-91408,width-400,height-225,resizemode-4\/ballon-dor-messi.jpg\" "\\"Lionel")
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