Cristiano Ronaldo has been in such scintillating form for the last 18 months that many people believe he is a shoe-in to land the coveted Ballon d’Or award for a second year in a row in January.
However a backlash to his apparently inevitable victory has already begun after European press and FIFA President, Sepp Blatter, teased that someone else should win the prize.
Experts believe that Blatter has already started to try and influence the decision for the Ballon d’Or by insisting that Manuel Neur should have picked up the best player of the World Cup award rather than Lionel Messi.
Carlo Ancelotti believes that Blatter has now gone out of his way to try and affect the final decision, which will be announced in January. The Real Madrid coach also believes that Ronaldo is the only person who should actually land the prize, while he also launched a stinging attack on Blatter too.
“It always surprises me what he does, but what can we do. It’s impossible to shut the mouth of the FIFA president. It is a subject that he always speaks about. There is not much to think about. It is Cristiano’s year, he has been scoring goals and winning important titles, and there is no doubt that the Ballon d’Or is his. Therefore those words do not make much sense.”
However it also seems as if the European press agree with Blatter’s assessment that a member of Germany’s World Cup winning team should pick up the accolade.
Despite the fact that Ronaldo is currently the clear favorite to win, Yahoo! Sports have now asked their collection of reporters from across Europe who should win the award and they believe that a German player, such as Manuel Neur, Philip Lahm or Thomas Mueller, should be selected. However they are all still adamant that the Portuguese forward will still come away with the prize.
It’s hard to disagree with the conclusion that Ronaldo deserves to win the Ballon d’Or. Not only did he score a record amount of goals in one Champions League season, 17 in 11 games, as Real Madrid won the 10th European Cup in their history, but he has now already scored 21 goals in just two months this season too.
He did fail to perform at the World Cup though.
In comparison Neur, Lahm and Mueller were each sensational throughout the competition as the German team combined perfectly to eclipse every side that they came up against and then lift the trophy. Unfortunately though the fact that none of the German national side’s individual performances truly stood out means that Ronaldo’s sensational solo form looks set to eclipse their collective efforts.
You can check out the full 23-man list of players that are currently in contention for the 2014 Ballon d’Or below.
ICYMI: The 23 contenders for the FIFA #BallondOr were revealed – http://t.co/ZNA2ZyR82O pic.twitter.com/hpfeFFZU2H
— FIFA.com (@FIFAcom) October 28, 2014
[Image via BP ]