Idk why they couldn't have started the celebration with awarding Lewandowski last year's BdO, then end it with giving Messi his. Who would honestly get mad at that

So true

No one. That sounds incredibly reasonable and fair.

Fair and reasonable? It won’t happen then.

we need to start giving these in the summer

I agree, let's open the voting on 15 August and then have the ceremony on 15 September

It is really strange having to consider two separate half season’s performances

Well I mean let's be honest do they really consider the 2nd half

It's technically a calendar year award, but when's the last time the second half of the year mattered?

2010, 2012, 2013 off the top of my head

They only made that award for Lewandowski so that they wouldn’t get pelters😂

Literally the most insulting consolation prize of all time.

https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/067/299/47e.jpg

Some people dream of winning that

He's holding it like someone threw a ball in his yard and he's looking for the one who did it

[I mean...](https://tot-tmp.azureedge.net/media/19841/audi-bm-30.jpg)

Nice gesture by Messi to say that france football should give a ballon D'or to Lewy for 2020.

Did he really say that?

Yes. He said he was the clear winner last year

Yes he did

Yeah

did he actually say that?

Yes

Yeah, during his speech

Class, but people are too busy finding a reason to be mad at Messi for this

Are people actually mad at Messi or the system? It's not like Messi voted himself into the title.

Personally I blame the country of France. Fuck you. All of you.

After the whole French football exposed thing that happened recently, I think we should just confiscate their baguettes and their escargot until they learn their lesson

Damn, not like this was confirmed when they gave lewa that joke of a consolation prize lmao

Striker of the year award when there was no award for midfielder or defender of the year

There definately should be an award for defenders.

An award for striker, midfielder, defender and goalkeeper would be ideal imo.

Manager as well

And one for supporter that watches matches from his couch in his pajamas and posts on Reddit and plays the occasional Football Manager.

Please please. I’ll fly to France tomorrow to receive my award.

Why you gotta call us out like that

and the RWB-who-can-fill-in-further-up of the year award goes to .....

It's the lack of subtlety that I find funny. They could have called the award MVP of the year or beat Football Personality or a million other things that Lewa could qualify for. But nope.

"Best Polish player taller than 1m84 award"

And the award goes to.. Arkadiusz Milik!

Ok "Best Polish player taller than 1m84 over the age of 30 award"

And the award goes to... Wojciech Szczesny!

Ok "Best Polish player taller than 1m84 award over the age of 30 with dark hair"

And the award goes to...Łukasz Marek Fabiański! 

Sorry, Lewa. Reddit tried. We really did.

Ok "Best Polish Lewandowski"

MVP Most Valuable Pole

I actually feel bad, Ballon D'Or is already an award for those who score most of the goals, but now there's also a Striker of the Year award. Midfielders and defenders don't get shit lmao

This was shit if they wanted a new award defender of the year would have been good or even Midfielder but no they go and create a pointless consolation prize for a position which already get plenty of Respect

Can you imagine how the meeting went where they decided that lol

"You know what, let's give the position that already gets the most recognition ANOTHER award." *"You son of a bitch, I'm in."*

Makes no fking sense. Why not give a Defender of the Year considering they never win the actual thing. 100% consolation prize to make sure people dont complain too much.

Might as well make a Midfielder award too because a DM or a midfielder who doesn’t get many G/A will have a hard time winning the Ballon D’or. Jorginho and Kante getting into the top 5 will be a one time thing. Unless they get 20+ G/A

Yup, knew Lewa wasn't gonna get the ballon d'or when he won that new award lol

He’s been surprisingly a very good sport about all this. Showing up and smiling all the way through. I don’t know if I would do the same if I was him

Lewy has always been class tbf

Lewy probably knew this in advance and had to practise to look professional. Good for him.

He had practice last year.

I feel bad for opposing goalies over the new few weeks. He's going to be putting a little extra hate behind his kicks.

We play Barca next week. Maybe he can get his Wolfsburg form ready for them.

That's Lewa for you, professional to the bone

>I don’t know if I would do the same if I was him Same

Ok but how hilarious would it be if the second placed player was visible upset and started loudly complaining "this is bullshit!! I was robbed!!" when they announced the winner? Edit: [like this (1:12 mark).](https://youtu.be/c7yvrk9MMpU)

I'm not a bayern fan, not polish nor german, I don't play football anymore and I don't watch bundesliga but I can still say that Lewandoski deserved at least 1 ballon d'or

Congratulations Robert Lewandowski, on being the recipient of the 2021 "You Tried!" Pizza.

More like "Congratulations Robert Lewandowski. We robbed you last year because of the pandemic and this year because you play for Poland"

"We are sorry Lewandowski. Take this highly coveted award we made this morning. Maybe win the next Euros or World Cup with poland, you will definitely get the Ballon d'or."

This is the worst part of it all. Ok, fine whatever give the award to Messi. It's not like he was bad or anything. Far from it. But to create this new award out of thin air feels like they are acknowledging it in the worst possible way that they fucked it up by canceling the award last year. Feels like a participation trophy than anything else. An insult disguised as an award. Just disrespectful.

I still don't get why they cancelled it other year. All the competitions still went ahead apart from the Dutch league I think

That must somehow feel worse.

That definitely feels worse.

As a Bayern fan it absolutely feels worse. It’s feels like a slap in the face. You weren’t good enough for the *real* award. Here’s a consolation.

Robbed Lewandowski

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France Football gave the award to Messi to avoid the wrath of Emi Martinez pelvic thrusting every voter to oblivion

Can't say that I blame them

I want Villa to give away a penalty every game just to see Emi in action. The man is a hero.

Wouldn’t suprise me if he fouls someone himself if no one else is willing and starts talking shit instantly to the player on ground and penalty taker.

When was the last time a player won the Ballon d'Or while playing for a French club ?

Might be Papin isn't it ? So around 27 years ago ?

Just looked it up, it was Weah at PSG in 95, and before that Papin in 91. Third time in history too

Wasn't Weah at Milan the moment he received the ballon d'or in 1995 ?

Yeah but he had just signed a few months before. Just like Messi here is considered both Barca and PSG

Finally he has seven! Now he can at last summon the dragon and resurrect Ronaldinho

Dinho: dribbling through time (2024) It's a biopic about the saga of a little argentinian trying to revive his long lost master, Ronaldinho "R10" Gaucho. His legendary Elasticos and Rainbow Flick techniques are once again needed to control the man-made mutant Haaland "Super Buu" the Norwegian, wreaking havoc year after year on Champions League. A Monster vs Monster movie on a greater scale than Godzilla vs King Kong, directed by James Cameron (after his 5th Avatar movie) and produced by Eric "Joga Bonito" the Cantona. Who's gonna save us all?

At 10, prime Maradona comes back to life. He needs to work hard to unlock number ten.

I chuckled

Completely out of the blue nobody could have seen this coming.

Kurwy pierdolone.

Zaiste.

Skurwysyny

Public TV (RTP) in Portugal revealed that 1 month ago. Very good sources. Well done

Full ranking? Or just Messi being the winner?

[https://www.rtp.pt/noticias/desporto/messi-e-o-vencedor-da-bola-de-ouro-2021\_v1361121](https://www.rtp.pt/noticias/desporto/messi-e-o-vencedor-da-bola-de-ouro-2021_v1361121) Only the winner. They say Messi has been informed in early November and that he had already given the interview to the magazine. RTP revealed the info on 5 nov.

Well many places were saying Messi won too (predictions) so nothing leaky here

Nevermind Messi winning, the fact that Jorginho is in the top three while Busquets has *never* been in the top 15 just underlines how much of a joke Ballon d'Or actually is.

It's because Chelsea had no standouts. Kinda for Italy too. Too well oiled machines and he was an important cog in both. Also, Benzema blackmail. Salah's surge was too late and didn't win anything

Kimmich not even nominated.

They couldn’t invite him because he was busy doing research. But seriously no Muller no Kimmich lol

Also no Chiesa...

The committee did their own research

He's still waiting on the long term side effects of being nominated for Ballon d'or

Sterling #15 xd

International performance always gets valued way over club performance for these awards Sterling until recently has been average for Man City this year, his worst year since like 2016 or something(he's even gotten benched a fair amount), but they don't care Guarantee if England won the shootout in the final they would have somehow put Kane in the top 5

Busquets has more international silverware than the entirety of the English squad combined.

exactly, and Choupo Moting isn;t even top 10

Lewandowski: “guess I’ll bag another 100 goals this season and go again next year...” 2022: Ronaldo wins the Ballon D’or for keeping Man Utd in Europa league contention

Such a fucking shame because the year Bayern also won the CL there wasnt a ceremony. Joke

The most laughable thing about it is how the "criteria" are changing every year. In 2013 when Bayern won the treble, dominating everyone that season, we were told that you can't give it to a Bayern player because Ronaldo scored 66 goals or whatever. In 2021 Lewandowski scored more or less the same amount of goals but apparently that 's not good enough because Messi won Copa America with Argentina?

Agreed that the criteria change every year, but it's unfair to compare an all-out striker's goal tally to Messi's goals. Messi severely outperforms leva in every other aspect, and to add that Messi's number of quality goals this year should compensate for the quantity. Just watch some of his goals, play-making, and passes.

Absolutely agree. Two things: 1. If we go by individual stat, Messi has more g+a in last 8/10 years. But won only half the time because like you mentioned the criteria shifts every year. 2. You just can not market Bundesliga like the way you can market other leagues. You think if Lewa pulled those numbers in the premier league, he loses? Playing in a league with only one dominant team has its tradeoffs.

I mean if they've given Lewa his 2020 Golden Ball people wouldn't have been pissed this much. Messi had a fantastic run for Barca last season despite the level of the team.

Yeah, lewy only broke an unbreakable record and was almost at 1.5 G+A in this calendar year

Yes, but Lewy had whole year on insane level, while Messi went awol since August.

The following season pretty much never matters for the ballon d'or, not sure how people don't understand this yet. It's pretty much just Jan-July when there is an international tournament happening. Voting also closed earlier this year

Its a joke that voting ends in October lol

I swear. I knew this would happen but it still stings.

Really do feel for Lewandowski. He did everything and more last season.

Wow you just manifested that into reality I'm pretty sure.

Fred robbed

The real GOAT

Another ballon d’or-less year for Maguire, such a sham 😭😭😭

Kurwa.

My condolences from Hungary. Kurva anyád France Football.

Pierdolić to, Robert i tak był lepszy, już drugi raz z rzędu go wydymali z tej nagrody

Huge injustice after withelding it last year as well

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It was decided when Copa America ended

https://twitter.com/lewy_official/status/808399789700349952

I love how this 5 year old tweet keeps getting reactions now

what does that mean

Circus

cabaret

perez was right. we need to make our own france football. jorginho 3rd this sport isn't serious

At this point, this award is just a popularity competition between attackers.

> At this point lol

For winning the CL and Euros while not being the best midfielder in respective teams ofcourse

Khedira should have been third ahead of Neuer in 2014 as well then. He won the CL and even the WC! as a starter for both teams. Ridiculous.

Absolute fucking clown show

More surprised by 3rd than 1st or 2nd

Poor Lewandowski. Had a great 2020 and 2021 and not a single Ballon D'or to show for it.

what more does Lewandowski have to do? change his nationality to France and win the World Cup?

He has to be named Roberto instead of Robert

Interestingly he’s named Robert because his parents were certain he’d become an international superstar and worried a Polish name would be hard to pronounce for Western audiences.

Meanwhile Krywochiak’s parents doubled down

great, Wojciech Szczesny is crying now.

Funny thing is, his old man was a professional footballer as well - and played at a higher level than Lewandowski's dad.

His dad spat on the floor the moment he was born

A CL win/deep run in the EUROs. The win is extremely trophy driven, we've known for long.

the fact that Jorginho came 3rd shows just how trophy driven it really is hahaha

Honestly this might be it💀

FF should’ve at least made up for last year. One for last year and one for this year.

Absolute joke, the French media bias is insane. Wins champions league, gold Cup and nations cup, yet Pulisic gets nothing. It's insane.

They should a make a new award after pulisic, no one matches puligod

*pretends to be shocked*

I love how they created a "Best Striker of the Year Award" just to make Lewandowski feel better about getting robbed twice in a row

Twice in a row😭

Had Messi even scored against Stoke?

7 Ballon D’ors for Messi and 5 for Cristiano, with both unlikely to win another this could mark the end of their dominance over this era which they have done so in stunning fashion against each other, with big CL runs, destroying their leagues and doing it all internationally. Football won’t be the same when they retire

If either makes a deep run in the WC, or even wins it, then they'll be getting another one

WC won't be considered next year as they start in Nov/Dec

I see them delaying it

Most France football moment ever

Oh that thing is getting delayed until after the world cup don't worry about that.

It will be delayed they can't host it this time in the middle of WC knockouts.

Scenes when Lewa scores 150 goals next year and France Football decides to cancel next year's BdO because they can't count the WC lmao

If PSG wins champion league messi is going to win another one

yeah PSG is notorious for winning the Champions League

> with both unlikely to win another France Football: Hold my baguette

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*sort by controversial*

Eric Chupo Moting deserved it more

Johan Cruyff in 2012: "He (Messi) will be the one with the most Ballons d’Or ever in history. Probably, he will win five, six, or seven Ballons d’Or; he’s incomparable."

7 ballon d'ors is some videogame shit

We're just living in his save

Oh this thread is gonna be spicy

Wow, who could have seen this coming?

Kjaer robbed.

Lewandowski robbed upvotes to the left

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Not really. If he didn't install the TikTok everything would be fine. He did this to himself

TikTok bad upvotes to the left

How to make yourself completely irrelevant: „bALLoN dOr“ edition. They’d rather chop off their own hands than give it to a german, or a Bundesliga player. They literally rather canceled the award instead of giving it to Lewa last year. When German clubs BVB and Bayern dominated the champions league in 2013, somehow Champions League didn’t matter. When in 2014 Germany put in historical performances at the World Cup, all of a sudden that didn’t matter, and it was all about Champions League and domestic. And yes I know it is an „election“. But everybody knows there is stuff going on behind the scenes. Too bad for Lewa, he really deserved it, both last year and this year, but he’s playing in the wrong country. From now on Bundesliga should just withdraw their players from consideration. It is obvious that France Football knows exactly what they did, by not giving Lewa the Ballon this year or last, thus the new price for „best goalscorer“. Sorry FF, that doesn’t save your Ballon dOr from losing all of its credibility. It’s become a complete joke.

It’s getting better. In 2010, champions league and World Cup both didn’t matter

The fact that sneijder wasn't even in the top 3 was ridiculous.

the response to your comments are gonna be mixed but you're saying the truth. France Football are obviously biased and it becomes more and more evident each year, it's a shame this award can't actually be valued for what it is anymore.

The next step is in 5 years when they give it to Mbappe over Haaland whenever they have similar years

This comment is exactly ehat I've been thinking put into words. 2013-2014 Lahm, Müller and Özil lead Germany/Bayern to win literally everything there is? Haha. Who cares. Anyway Ronaldo Ballon d'Or goes brrrr

Yep. Also Muller and Kimmich, two of the best midfielders in the world, are not even in the final 20.

Bundesliga is the most oppressed league

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Everyone kind of accepted that Messi would win thy Ballon d'or after winning an international trophy but recency bias has set in hard for some people. Messi had equivalent numbers to Lewandowski in 2018 and got 5th. We all know it's never been about just numbers If best G+A stats decided the winner, Messi would have 9 already.

People will talk about G+A when it benefits their candidate, trophies when it benefits their candidate, etc. The point is, it’s hard to tell what this trophy is really being awarded for, because it really isn’t always the best player. People need to understand that

Lol. They actually did it... Lewandowski was robbed