Lionel Messi won his record 7th Ballon d’Or award on Monday edging out Robert Lewandowski 613-580 when all the ballots were counted. The 34 year old forward previously captured the award in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2015, and 2019.
While no one can argue that Messi is one of the greatest soccer players of his generation, more than a few fans and players expressed confusion over his selection as the 2021 award winner. Many felt that Lewandowski or Chelsea’s Jorginho had put together stronger cases for the award, while even Messi himself conceded that he hoped that the committee would consider naming Lewandowski the 2020 award winner (last year’s ceremony was cancelled due to COVID).
In his acceptance speech, the Argentinian quipped “Robert, you deserve your Ballon d’Or. Last year, everyone was in agreement to say that you were the big winner of this award…Hopefully France Football will give you the 2020 Ballon d’Or. We all believe you deserved it and I hope you can have it at home.”
Messi had a solid year with his club teams and also helped Argentina capture the Copa America. But you could argue that there were a half dozen players who could make similar claims, while posting equal if not better statistics. Which is why at its core, the Ballon d’Or is more of a popularity contest than a scoring title or league MVP award.
Going back to 2008, only one man (2018’s winner Luka Modric) has broken up the streak of Messi or Ronaldo taking home the annual award. While there have been years where their award was undoubtedly deserved, there have also been some head scratchers sprinkled in as well.
Voting for the award is comprised of 180 journalists in 180 different countries based on the following criteria:
1. Individual and team performance in 2021 calendar year
2. Talent and sportsmanship of the player
3. The player’s overall career.
While the criteria itself is vague to begin with, the inclusion of a player’s overall career accomplishments in an annual award is downright perplexing. Which is likely why you see the same names taking home the trophy year, after year, after year. Because while only soccer purists may know the names of some of the up and coming stars of the sport, every man, woman and child on the planet has likely heard the name Ronaldo or Messi, be it due to their athletic prowess or media/marketing campaigns.
Perhaps some of the voters consider all the criteria before filling out their ballots, some may even deep dive into advanced analytics to help sway their decision. But for every voter who agonizes over what name to put down, there’s likely 1 or 2 more who have never even seen the players they’re voting on play in person before. Which is why if you’re going to make it a global award, you’re going to get the most global players winning the trophy.
Afterall, not every sports department has the budget to fly their correspondents all over the planet.
-Kyle Skinner
Twitter: @JKyleSkinner