Sports

FIFA Best Player award: Messi votes for Ronaldo

Published

5 years ago

September 26, 2018

Lionel Messi voted for Cristiano Ronaldo in The FIFA Best Men ’ s Player award – albeit behind Luka Modric and Kylian Mbappe , Europe Eurosport. com reports .Meanwhile , Nigeria coach Gernot Rohr and captain Mikel Obi voted fora Modric and Messi respectively for the top award .

Rohr voted for Modric in the first place and Mbappe in second place . Mikel voted for Messi , who was not shortlisted , as his best player while Mbappe and Modric came second and third in his voting .

After a history of snubs involving world football ’ s most revered duo , Messi elected to issue Ronaldo with a solitary point in the 2018 vote . It was not enough to propel his nemesis to victory , however , as Modric ended the Ronaldo – Messi stranglehold on the award .

Perhaps unsurprisingly , Ronaldo was not as kind and cast his three votes for Raphael Varane , Modric and Antoine Griezmann .

International captains and head coaches , plus journalists from FIFA member countries , were invited to pick their top three players from the 2017 – 18 season – with their first pick receiving five points , second receiving three points , and third receiving one point . Messi and Ronaldo got to vote as captains of Argentina and Portugal respectively .

England ’ s Golden Boot winner Harry Kane , probably still reeling from his nation’ s loss to Croatia in the World Cup semi – finals , opted to ignore Modric ’ s stellar season in favour of Ronaldo , Messi and Kevin De Bruyne .

Kane was voted the best player by an illustrious trio : Bahamas coach Dion Godet , Chinese Taipei coach Gary White and Vanuatu journalist Nase Raymond. It was not enough to make the final shortlist .