Looking beyond England, what of Alfredo Di St\u00e9fano<\/a>, who had inspired Real Madrid to the inaugural European Cup? Or one of the Athletic Bilbao players who had just won La Liga? Or Pivatelli, who had been top-scorer in Serie A? Or Giuliano Sarti, the goalkeeper who had won the Scudetto with Fiorentina? Or Nikita Simonyan, whose goals had powered Spartak Moscow to the Soviet title? Matthews was 38, and there\u2019s a clear sense that the inaugural Ballon d\u2019Or was something of a lifetime achievement award.<\/p>\n Perhaps that is fine. Maybe the award should recognise longevity. What, after all, is it for? It\u2019s certainly not just about how much a player wins in a given year. If it were, Fabi\u00e1n Ruiz would be a hot favourite on Monday, having won the World Cup, the Champions League and Ligue 1 this season.<\/p>\n Yet fine player though the midfielder undoubtedly is, he would be neither Paris Saint-Germain nor Spain\u2019s player of the season. Besides, an award for winning lots of other awards is the definition of gilding the lily. There\u2019s perhaps even an argument that individual awards represent an opportunity to acknowledge those who strive and delight but rarely win medals.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a>Free newsletter |Every weekday<\/p>\n Sign up to Football Daily<\/p>\n Kick off your evenings with the Guardian’s take on the world of football<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n According to its website, the Ballon d\u2019Or is \u201cawarded based on three essential pillars \u2026 individual performance, team achievements, and class combined with fair play.\u201d The \u201ccomplete\u201d winner will be defined by a \u201ccombination of talent, sportsmanship and competitive excellence\u201d.<\/p>\n Team achievement is perhaps easiest to isolate. PSG have largely ditched their egos as Luis Enrique has led them to back-to-back Champions Leagues, but how do you tease out which of their exceptional front three has been the most important? Ousmane Demb\u00e9l\u00e9 won that battle last year<\/a>. Khvicha Kvaratskhelia was arguably the standout this year, but, in a World Cup year, can a player whose country didn\u2019t qualify be regarded as the best individual? And neither Demb\u00e9l\u00e9 nor the other member of the trio, Desir\u00e9 Dou\u00e9, had an especially notable World Cup.<\/p>\n Given the relative level of the French league and the fact PSG can rest players for domestic games to keep them fresh for Europe, it\u2019s arguable the greatest achievement by a European club last season came from Arsenal, as they won the Premier League and reached the Champions League final. But their strength is the collective, and only three of the 30-man shortlist are Arsenal players, but none of Gabriel, William Saliba or Declan Rice had stellar World Cups.<\/p>\n What then of Spain? They too are a team short on star quality, certainly when Lamine Yamal is carrying an injury as he did for the first few months of this year. They won the World Cup, ultimately, because of the collective strength of their midfield. Rodri is the embodiment of their approach, but his involvement at Manchester City in the second half of last season was restricted.<\/p>\n Bayern Munich\u2019s Harry Kane heads home against Stuttgart: 61 in 51 club games last season represents a remarkable record. Photograph: Annegret Hilse\/Reuters<\/p>\n Real Madrid have just endured one of only five trophyless seasons this century, which weakens the claims of Kylian Mbapp\u00e9 and Jude Bellingham and Vin\u00edcius. Lionel Messi had great moments at the World Cup but playing in MLS reduces his chances. Which perhaps means it\u2019s time again to reward somebody who has had a good year, even if he went out of the World Cup in the semis and the Champions League in the quarters: Harry Kane<\/a>.<\/p>\n Goals in the Bundesliga may not quite have the currency they did when Karl-Heinz Rummenigge was scoring them, but 61 in 51 club games last season represents a remarkable record, and he also got six at the World Cup, winning the game against the Democratic Republic of the Congo almost by force of individual will.<\/p>\n In a season without an obvious outstanding candidate, there seems a strong possibility that the panel, just as it did in 1956, will reward consistency and longevity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Systems football began In 1963 (On the hallowed turf at Wembley) With the impact of a cynical foul…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":939794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-939793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/939793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=939793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/939793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/939794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=939793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=939793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=939793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/1792885647_746_500.jpg\")
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