Liverpool was also robbed, as evidenced by Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi’s Ballon d’Or selections.
Liverpool was robbed, as evidenced by Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi’s Ballon d’Or selections.
Liverpool players did well on the Ballon d’Or shortlist, but given what happened to Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, they could have done better.
In general, Lionel Messi cannot lodge too many grievances with the Ballon d’Or selection committee. He has won the honor a record seven times in the course of his career, including last year when Mohamed Salah finished in seventh place and Liverpool supporters booed him.
But if it weren’t for Cristiano Ronaldo, the diminutive Argentinean player might have won even more accolades. From 2008 to 2017, they alternated winning the prize, and Luka Modri’s victory in 2017 was merely a protest against having the same winners for so long. The primary debate over the 2022 shortlist is centered on this pair of defining figures from an era.
For the first time since 2005, Messi is entirely absent from the 30-man list. This alone is a remarkable tribute to his stamina at the top of his profession. However, he can legitimately feel aggrieved to see his streak end, especially since Ronaldo has made the list.
Ronaldo was the driving force behind United’s failure to advance to the Champions League the previous year. Although the Portuguese forward finished as the club’s leading scorer and still put up respectable individual numbers, there is a general consensus outside of Old Trafford that he made the team less effective as a whole. This undoubtedly needs to be considered, even for a single award.
In any case, Messi still has the advantage over his former foe when comparing the numbers. With 21 league goals each, the two players tied for first place. The Argentine’s 15 assists for PSG highlighted his abilities as a top playmaker, which Ronaldo has never been able to match. The former Barcelona player completed his task in more than 300 minutes less than his previous record.
Similar to Modri’s Ballon d’Or victory in 2018, Messi’s complete exclusion feels like a protest against the status quo. There is no getting around the fact that the PSG move has not been as successful as hoped, but his statistics from the previous year continue to be almost unreal.
With 99th percentile progressive passes, 98th percentile progressive carries, 96th percentile pass completion, 95th percentile expected non-penalty goals per 90 minutes, 96th percentile expected assists, and 99th percentile shot-creating actions when compared to attacking midfielders and wingers in the top five leagues, Messi is still in a league of his own. The list continues.
In almost every aspect, Ronaldo’s profile is worse. In the one area where he actually has an advantage over Messi, he is now only trading in goals. It is incomprehensible that his 2021/22 Manchester United season is ranked among the 30 best in Europe given that the Ballon d’Or is now determined over the course of a season rather than a year.
The campaigns of six current Liverpool players—Salah, Virgil van Dijk, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Fabinho, Luis Dáz, and Darwin Néz—were deemed deserving of nomination. That’s not bad, and given his understated contribution to the team and his struggles to earn a spot for Brazil, some may have even been surprised that Fabinho received such recognition.
Even so, Messi can join a host of other Liverpool players in alleging they were robbed if Ronaldo is good enough to make the list. After all, Jürgen Klopp’s team finished the Premier League with 92 points, advanced to the Champions League final, and won two trophies. Everyone who had a significant part in that can essentially say that they had a better season than the Manchester United veteran.
Alisson is one of those who could be regarded as having been most unlucky to lose out. Though Thibaut Courtois, his opponent from the Champions League final, has made it onto the main list, he has been nominated for the Yashin Trophy, which is only given to goalkeepers. The success of Liverpol last season was entirely supported by the Brazilian goalkeeper, perhaps even more so than Fabinho.
Then there is Jol Matip, who for significant stretches of the season outperformed Van Dijk. Like Messi, he ranks among his positional peers in at least the 95th percentile for both progressive passes and progressive carries, as well as for the total number of non-penalty expected goals and assists. The Liverpool team’s campaign benefited greatly from his distinctive presence.
Finally, Andy Robertson has a pretty compelling argument. He contributed 13 goals from left wing in the Premier League, only eight more than Ronaldo and Messi. Although Alexander-Arnold is perhaps the more versatile of the two full-backs, it is their various playing approaches that make Liverpool such a potent wide threat. He once again excelled in terms of defense.
It might be a bit excessive to include nine Liverpool players on a 30-man Ballon d’Or shortlist. However, the presence of Ronaldo raises a number of questions because it is plain to see that he had a worse season than each of the players mentioned above. There will undoubtedly be some complaints at Anfield, though Messi may have the biggest one of them all.
