The Ballon d’Or ceremony will feature an unexpected award. The official Ballon d’Or website has confirmed that Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are both in the running to be named the BOAT. Unlike previous awards, the winner will be decided by fans, who must choose the player they believe has demonstrated the greatest quality in the entire history of the Ballon d’Or.
For almost 15 years, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi dominated world football. They shattered records and set benchmarks that many believe will be impossible to surpass in the coming years. Now, as both players approach the end of their careers, the official Ballon d’Or website has announced a new award that the Portuguese and Argentine superstars are competing to win. Welcome to the era of the BOAT.
The award was launched at the beginning of October, and voting will remain open until the 27th of this month. The website responsible for the Ballon d’Or awards in London describes it as the award for the greatest Ballon d’Or performance of all time. Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are not the only players competing for the honour.
Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Ronaldo Nazário, Marco van Basten, Michel Platini, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, Kevin Keegan, Franz Beckenbauer, Johan Cruyff and Alfredo Di Stéfano are the nominees selected by the website. Fans who wish to participate in the vote must pay €1 to the magazine’s official accounts.
The aim is to recognize the greatest Ballon d’Or-winning performance of all time. France Football’s website features the various awards won by Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo in the years when they finished ahead of their rivals. So far, the Portuguese star is leading the race and appears poised to win the BOAT.
More than 62% of the votes cast on the Ballon d’Or website indicate that Cristiano Ronaldo’s 2008 performance should be chosen as the greatest Ballon d’Or-winning campaign of all time. At that point, the Portuguese forward was leading Manchester United through a golden era in every respect. His numbers currently remain unmatched in a vote that does not involve journalists, professional footballers or coaches.
Messi is in second place behind Cristiano Ronaldo among the magazine’s 10 nominees. His 2012 Ballon d’Or campaign has received 13% of the votes, the year in which he scored a total of 91 official goals across the 12 months of the calendar year. Third place also belongs to the Argentine, for the award he won in 2023 after Argentina’s triumph at the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
For many, this award is an opportunity to recognize the footballers who changed the history of the Ballon d’Or forever. It is worth remembering that Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are the two most decorated players in the award’s history. As both approach the end of their careers, it will be the fans who decide who deserves to be crowned the greatest Ballon d’Or winner of all time.