Ballon d’Or: meet all the nominees

This year, the Yashin Prize will be awarded to the best goalkeeper for the first time; added to the traditional male Golden Ball, Female Golden Ball, Kopa Trophy for the best player under 21 years old.

For the male category there are 30 nominated players, while for the female 20 and they will be chosen under the criteria of 230 (180 for the male prize and 50 for the female) specialized journalists. The task of the jurors will be to choose five candidates, who will be awarded a score; They will also have to take into account important criteria such as individual and collective actions, the player's class (talent and fair play) and his career, as As explains.

The list is expected to be reduced to just three names before the award ceremony, which will take place at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris on December 2.

Men's Golden Ball

As expected, both Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo appear on the long list of nominated players. However, it is not certain that either is the winner, it is enough to see what happened last season when Luka Modric ended the hegemony that prevailed 10 years ago. In addition, the Croatian becomes the first case where he is not nominated the year after he won the prize.

Among the favorites is Virgil Van Dijk, the Liverpool defender and who has stood out not only in the wonderful past season but in the current one, as the English club at the beginning of the new campaign lasted nine games undefeated. We will have to wait if the English club's defense is among the three final nominees, just one step away from the Golden Ball.

For Latin America, in addition to Argentina's Messi, the nominees are Sergio Agüero, Manchester City striker; Roberto Firmino, Liverpool striker and Marquinhos, defender of Paris Saint-Germain.

Female Golden Ball

Unlike the male category, the winner of last edition, Ada Hegerberg, does appear on the list of the 20 nominees. The Olympique Lyon player won last season not only for her performance, but for winning the women's Champions League and the French League.

However, for this year the favorite is not her, because another name sounds. Precisely that of the American Megan Rapinoe, who not only won the Women's World Cup this year, but became an icon in the fight for LGBT rights, equality between men and women and also in the opposition of President Donald Trump.

Among the nominees, there are also Brazilian legend Marta, the popular goalkeeper Alex Morgan, among others.

Read also: Golden Boy: What are the 5 favorites to win the prize?

Kopa Trophy

The prize given to those under 21 years of age “on December 31 of this year in question”, as explained by As. Unlike the criteria of the Golden Ball, here his performances on the court are evaluated as well That talent and fair play. In addition, in this category the winner is chosen by the past winners.

In this way, the next successor to Kylian Mbappé is among the following nominees:

Yashin Trophy

As we already mentioned, this category debuts in this edition of the awards and is named in honor of Lev Yashin, the only goalkeeper in history who has won the Golden Ball, in 1963.

Both Alisson Becker, Liverpool goalkeeper; and Ederson, Manchester City goalkeeper are the representatives for South America. However, the first figure as the big favorite to win the prize.