Barcelona forward player Lionel Messi has won the “Ballon d’Or” award for the world’s best football player. Also, Messi set a new record by winning this award sixth time. Since 2015, it is the first Ballon d’Or for the 32-year-old veteran.
It took a lot for the player to win this award this time, it came after he scored 54 times for the club and the country in 2018-19. This also led to the victory of Barca in La Liga.
Virgil van Dijk stood second in the list, making the figures as, one of four Liverpool players were in the top seven, including Sadio Mane at the fourth rank. On the other hand, Portugal forward Cristiano Ronaldo, who has won this award five times, came third in the voting.
This year, the new record set by Messi makes La Liga the 11th consecutive winner of the Ballon d’Or award. Since 2008 the, award was monopolized by Messi and Ronaldo, but last year’s winner Luka Modric broke the 10-year Messi-Ronaldo monopoly on the prize.
What did the veteran say?
As said by Messi on the award ceremony, “Today is my sixth Ballon d’Or. It’s a completely different moment, I lived with my family and my children. As my wife said, you must never stop dreaming but always work to improve and continue to enjoy. This makes me feel very lucky, I am blessed.”
“I hope to continue for a long time. And I realize that I am very lucky, even if, one day, retirement will ring. It will be difficult”.
Recently, Messi notched up 700 appearances for Barca. During all this time he scored tremendous 614 goals and also won 34 trophies, including 10 La Liga and four Champions League titles, and a number of other records and awards.
The Argentine, who had won the La Liga title with Barcelona and could only manage third place in the Copa America final with his country. Messi set a new record by overtaking Christiano Ronaldo and adding to his 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2015 and 2019 trophies.
What does Van Dijk have to say?
“It was an amazing year, but there’s a couple of players like that who are a bit unnatural,” Van Dijk said for Messi and Ronaldo. “So you need to respect greatness as well.”
“I was close, but there was just someone a little bit better,” said Dijk. He also said that “I’m very proud of what I achieved last year with Liverpool and Holland, and hopefully we can do that again this year. But that will be tough with those guys around here still.
What is Ballon d’Or?
One sports Journalist from every country votes for the players and on the basis of a number of votes, the player is given an award. The award is given by France Football since 1956. England’s Stanley Matthews was the first winner of the award.
Till 1995, the award was only for European players, but then it expanded to become open for any player at a European club. And from 2007 it was opened up for the rest of the world. The award is also the highest honor given only to the men football players from around the world.
List of the players for Ballon d’Or award rank wise
1. Lionel Messi (Barcelona and Argentina)
2. Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool and Netherlands)
3. Cristiano Ronaldo (Juventus and Portugal)
4. Sadio Mane (Liverpool and Senegal)
5. Mohamed Salah (Liverpool and Egypt)
6. Kylian Mbappe (Paris St-Germain and France)
7. Alisson (Liverpool and Brazil)
8. Robert Lewandowski (Bayern Munich and Poland)
9. Bernardo Silva (Manchester City and Portugal)
10. Riyad Mahrez (Manchester City and Algeria)
11. Frenkie de Jong (Barcelona and Netherlands)
12. Raheem Sterling (Manchester City and England)
13. Eden Hazard (Real Madrid and Belgium)
14. Kevin de Bruyne (Manchester City and Belgium)
15. Matthijs de Ligt (Juventus and Netherlands)
16. Sergio Aguero (Manchester City and Argentina)
17. Roberto Firmino (Liverpool and Brazil)
18. Antoine Griezmann (Barcelona and France)
19. Trent Alexander-Arnold (Liverpool and England)
20. Dusan Tadic (Ajax and Serbia)
20. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (Arsenal and Gabon)
22. Son Heung-min (Tottenham and South Korea)
23. Hugo Lloris (Tottenham and France)
24. Kalidou Koulibaly (Napoli and Senegal)
24. Marc-Andre ter Stegen (Barcelona and Germany)
28. Donny van de Beek (Ajax and Netherlands)
28. Joao Felix (Atletico Madrid and Portugal)
28. Marquinhos (Paris St-Germain and Brazil)
This is how the list ends for the year 2019, Several new records set by Messi and Ronaldo this year. For Messi, one is the sixth Ballon d’Or title and of scoring the maximum number of goals in UEFA. For further updates related to football stay tuned with Talepost.