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History suggests Lionel Messi will claim his sixth Ballon d’Or

The footballer with most points after an elaborate voting procedure by jury members from around the globe will lift the 2019 Ballon d’Or trophy.

History suggests Lionel Messi will claim his sixth Ballon d’Or

Lionel Messi file image. (Photo by PAU BARRENA / AFP)

Ballon d’Or is the next big thing in the world of football and on 2 December 2019, the world will know who the football fraternity believes to be the best player in the world in this calendar year. The footballer with most points after an elaborate voting procedure by jury members from around the globe will lift the 2019 Ballon d’Or trophy. However, historical evidence suggests that Lionel Messi might win the coveted award this year.

The evidence hints that Lionel Messi might go on to lift his record sixth Ballon d’Or on Monday. If that indeed turns out to be true, he would become the most successful player since the inception of the award as he will leave behind his long-time rival Cristiano Ronaldo who is currently tied with Messi- both of them having 5 awards to their name currently.

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Here is the evidence we have been talking about. FIFA and Ballon d’Or separated a few years back and this meant that FIFA came out with their own set of awards which is known by the name of The Best FIFA Football Awards. This award was started in 2016 and since then the player to win the Best FIFA Football awards has gone on to win the Ballon d’Or as well.

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Cristiano Ronaldo won The Best FIFA Award in 2016 and 2017, he bagged the Ballon d’Or in both these years. Luka Modric won the FIFA award in 2018 and he too won the Ballon d’Or later in the year. Moreover, eight out of the nine positions, top three positions in each of these three years- have been repeated in 2019 Ballon d’Or- the only exception being the case of Mohamed Salah, who finished third in the Best FIFA Football awards but did not manage a podium finish in 2019 Ballon d’Or.

Messi, as we know, has already bagged The Best FIFA Football award, and thus will be the favourite to lift another Ballon d’Or on Monday.

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