The 2024 Ballon d’Or voting results has been leaked, with the top 12 best players’ points revealed ahead of the award ceremony.
The award ceremony will be held in Paris on Monday, October 28, 2024, with elite footballers across top leagues in Europe set to wrestle for the prestigious individual award.
Inter Miami forward and Barcelona legend Lionel Messi is the holder of the award after beating Erling Haaland and Kylian Mbappe to win it in 2023.
The Argentine footballing genius is also a record winner of the award, having clinched it eight times more than any other player in the award’s history.
Al-Nassr forward, Real Madrid and Manchester United legend Cristiano Ronaldo is another footballer who has won the award the most times after Lionel Messi, having clinched it five times.
Notably, both Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi have dominated the award in the past sixteen years since 2007, sharing it 13 times between them.
2024 Ballon d’Or to be won by another footballer apart from Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi
Now, it will be the third time that the Men’s Best Player of the Year Award will go to a different footballer apart from Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi.
According to a leaked voting result for all the nominated players in contention for the award, Antonio Rudiger is in 12th place in the rankings.
At the 11th, 10th, 9th, and 8th places are Real Madrid and Spanish defender Dani Carvajal, Bayern Leverkusen and German midfielder Florian Wirtz, Barcelona and Spanish midfielder Dani Olmo, and Manchester City and England midfielder Phil Foden, respectively.
Barcelona and Spain’s youngster Lamine Yamal, Manchester City and Norway’s forward Erling Haaland, Bayern Munich and England’s forward Harry Kane, and Real Madrid and France’s striker Kylian Mbappe occupy the 7th, 6th, 5th, and 4th place, respectively.
2024 Ballon d'Or
The top three ranked players on the list are Real Madrid and Brazilian forward Vinicius Jr with 630 points, Manchester City and Spanish defensive midfielder Rodri with 570 points, and Real Madrid and England midfielder Jude Bellingham with 422 points.
From the foregoing, Vinicius Jr is expected to clinch the award for the first time in his career. The Real Madrid sensation played a pivotal role as Los Blancos won the UEFA Champions League and La Liga last season.
He scored six goals with four assists in the Champions League and was involved in 20 La Liga goals for the club.
Controversies over leaked 2024 Ballon d’Or rankings
As usual, there are pocket of controversies surrounding the leaked rankings. Vinicius Jr, who is slated to clinch the award arguably had a brilliant individual campaign at club level but struggled on the international scene.
His closest contenders to the award – Rodri and Jude Bellingham – had far better individual campaigns than the Brazilian. Rodri reached the semifinals of the UEFA Champions League and won Euro 2024 with Spain.
Jude Bellingham also had a solid individual campaign. He won the UEFA Champions League and La Liga with Real Madrid, had more goal involvements in La Liga than Vinicius Jr and also reached the final of the 2024 Euros.
The full list of the top voting results is as follows:
Vinicius Junior (Brazil, Real Madrid) – 630 points
Rodri (Spain, Man City) – 576 points
Jude Bellingham (England, Real Madrid) – 422 points
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