(SPOILER WARNING)2018 Ballon d'Or final list has leaked

[JayKing]

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[Evilo]

Can' say how many lol, but nothing new.
Modric is winning wouldn't be my choice, but it's understandable. He had a poor january and february. Just like the rest of the team, he woke up after the first leg against PSG, got hot in the CL. In the WC, he had a strong group stage but was hardly dominant the rest of the way. This season he's been poor. Overal, that's not a great year.
Ronaldo second puzzles me. Awful until march too, great CL run, poor WC, disappeared until september/october or so in Serie A. That's not a lot of great games. What has he done to be ranked above Messi for instance? Messi was better in Liga and WC and much better since the second half season began. Puzzling that the CL run would weigh so heavily.
In that case, why wouldn't a WC winner weigh heavily too?
Griezmann however is a poor choice IMO. He was hardly the best french player in the WC (Lloris, Varane, Kante, Pogba and Mbappe were better). Can't say he has dominated this year.
Mbape 4th. Should be higher. Just for the WC. And his records in pretty much every competition (L1, CL, WC).
Messi 5th. Again if you vote for the best player he should be first. If you vote for the best season he has nothing to do 3 spots behind Ronaldo.
Salah 6th, no complaining here.
Varane 7th LOL. Much better year then Cannavaro when he won the Bd'O.
Hazard 8th. Right. Hazard had a better WC than Modric and a better half season this year. He certainly should be 3 or 4 spots earlier.
KDB 9th, Kane 10th, Kante 11th. You have to wonder who had the best season between the 3. One is WC though and had a dominant tournament save for the final (where he played sick).

All in all, that's another poor ranking IMO.

 

[Evilo]

Also if the rumors turn true that Griezmann and Ronaldo have refused to travel to Paris because they're mad at Modric getting it (even though neither deserve it), then their poor sportsmanship will show.
Not very surprising, these two together may have the IQ of an hoyster.

 

[Evilo]

Also, Mbappe first two pro seasons :
7th, 4th.

 

[JeffreyLFC]

Also if the rumors turn true that Griezmann and Ronaldo have refused to travel to Paris because they're mad at Modric getting it (even though neither deserve it), then their poor sportsmanship will show.
Not very surprising, these two together may have the IQ of an hoyster.

That would not surprise me and both can f*** off.

 

[YNWA14]

Sneijder was more deserving for 2010 than Modric for 2018 but I'm not mad about it. Modric is amazing and if we just voted best player Messi would always win. Even this year you could argue Messi deserved no lower than 2nd.

 

[ecemleafs]

Should be james Forrest. Not his fault Scotland isn't good enough to make the world cup.

 

[Wee Baby Seamus]

Can' say how many lol, but nothing new.
Modric is winning wouldn't be my choice, but it's understandable. He had a poor january and february. Just like the rest of the team, he woke up after the first leg against PSG, got hot in the CL. In the WC, he had a strong group stage but was hardly dominant the rest of the way. This season he's been poor. Overal, that's not a great year.
Ronaldo second puzzles me. Awful until march too, great CL run, poor WC, disappeared until september/october or so in Serie A. That's not a lot of great games. What has he done to be ranked above Messi for instance? Messi was better in Liga and WC and much better since the second half season began. Puzzling that the CL run would weigh so heavily.
In that case, why wouldn't a WC winner weigh heavily too?
Griezmann however is a poor choice IMO. He was hardly the best french player in the WC (Lloris, Varane, Kante, Pogba and Mbappe were better). Can't say he has dominated this year.
Mbape 4th. Should be higher. Just for the WC. And his records in pretty much every competition (L1, CL, WC).
Messi 5th. Again if you vote for the best player he should be first. If you vote for the best season he has nothing to do 3 spots behind Ronaldo.
Salah 6th, no complaining here.
Varane 7th LOL. Much better year then Cannavaro when he won the Bd'O.
Hazard 8th. Right. Hazard had a better WC than Modric and a better half season this year. He certainly should be 3 or 4 spots earlier.
KDB 9th, Kane 10th, Kante 11th. You have to wonder who had the best season between the 3. One is WC though and had a dominant tournament save for the final (where he played sick).

All in all, that's another poor ranking IMO.

1.The narrative formed for Modric over the summer, but he's been pretty poor as Madrid have been godawful so far this season. Don't love it.
2.Don't quite understand Ronaldo being second, but Bd'O gonna Bd'O
3. Griezmann? Of all the members of the WC squad? Seems like a really weird take. Then again, I thought it was weird that he won the Bronze Ball at the WC.
4. Mbappe should prob be top 3 honestly, what a year.
5. Messi should just kinda perma-win it, and he's also been great in the new season, which you cannot say about many of these guys.
6. Salah, yeah alright fair enough, especially as he's started to get into form domestically again.
7. Varane getting credit at all is really dope, but he should be higher.
8. Hazard should be top 3 IMO but I'm also incredibly biased. Was the best player at the WC. Has slowed down domestically because of stupid f***ing Morata, but has still probably been the best player in the EPL so far this season.
9, 10, 11. I'll disagree with you here. KdB was the best player in the league last season, including Salah, IMO. As much as I adore Kante, I can absolutely understand KdB over him. Kane, not so much.

 

[Evilo]

Agreed on everything except the last sentences. KdB was better than Kante in the EPL, I think that's fair.
But how about the WC? And the new half season (injured I know but you don't perform from the stands)?

Kante > KdB this calendar year.

 

[hatterson]

Ronaldo is second because he went absolutely nuts in the spring in terms of scoring goals.

From Jan 21 until the end of Real's season he had 28 goals in 20 apps. Basically all he had to do was not flop at Juve and he was going to get a top 3 spot.

 

[Evilo]

In a WC year, hell no.
Neuer should have won it in 2014.
Iniesta and Xavi came in 2nd and 3rd in 2010.
Cannavaro won it in 2006 depite having a laughable second half of the season.
Ronaldo won it in 02 even though it was hardly his best season. Kahn was 3rd because of a dominant WC.
Zidane won it in 98, Suker was second.
Stoichkov and Baggio finished 1 and 2 in 94 after their great WC.
Mattheaus won it in 90 from that great Germany team.

WC, every 4 years, is and should be weighed heavily. Ronaldo had no business being on the podium. And certainly not above Messi.

Ronaldo scored 45 goals and 12 assists in 2018.
Messi scored 45 goals and 23 assists.
Then again you have to go back to 2015 to find more Ronaldo goals than Messi's in a calendar year. With the assist race always easily won by Messi. Which didn't prevent Ronaldo from winning the last Bd'O.

http://messivsronaldo.net/calendar-year-stats/

 

[Luigi Habs]

People not voting for Messi take his achievements and level of play for granted.

Modric was great from March to July. Ronaldo from march to May.
Mbappe was better overall throughout the full year. Messi as well.

For me I’d have gone
1-Messi
2-Mbappe
3-Modric

 

[Evilo]

Griez is there in the end. Messi and Ronaldo aren't though
Griez says it seems CL or league is weighed more heavily than the WC, which is weird.
For once, he doesn't say something stupid.
Except Varane could claim WC+CL. Nobody else could.

 

[Deficient Mode]

Messi's placements in this the past five years has taken away any credibility the award ever had.

 

[Pouchkine]

In a WC year the winner must have had a great World Cup. Messi didn't. To be honest nobody really was a clear cut #1 this year. I have no real problem with Modric winning, but in the big picture when people will look back at 2018 they will remember France winning the WC. France had too many players who had a strong WC so they kinda divided the vote...

In the end I'm happy the Messi-Ronaldo monopoly is broken.

 

[JeffreyLFC]

Messi's placements in this the past five years has taken away any credibility the award ever had.

I know he has not have the success in term of team achievenent like the others listed (WC, CL) but as far as personal achievements and talent he is unquestionable the top. I feel like the ballon d'or is not anymore an individual award but more or so the best player on winning teams award.

 

[StevenF1919]

Maybe it wasn't entirely deserved but there's no player I'd rather see win the Balloon D'or than Modric. Great guy and a hell of a player.

 

[Prntscrn]

Ehh wtf?

 

[Savi]

There's plenty to say about this list, but how does Bale even make it on there let alone placing higher than Ramos or Marcelo who were WAY better on his own club

 

[YNWA14]

Oh wow (in reference to the twerking thing).

 

[robertmac43]

Would tend to agree with there not being a clear #1 player. Modric is well deserving of the award. It's great to see someone who is not Messi or Ronaldo win and I think my favourite part of the narrative is that is not known for primarily scoring goals.

 

[Scandale du Jour]

Ehh wtf?

The pig who asked that, wow

 

[Islesfan22]

Well deserved for Luka Modric. You had an unbelievable season and is one of the greatest midfielders ever. Pure joy to watch this man play football.

 

[Name Nameless]

Oh wow (in reference to the twerking thing).

Let's hope the world does not make her award be about that...

 

[robertmac43]

Terrible on the host's part there....absolutely terrible