95.7%. This is the ratio of first place obtained by Karim Benzema during the votes for the Golden Ball. The Real Madrid striker who triumphed on Monday night in Paris has been placed in first place by 89 out of 93 voters for football’s biggest individual award. This year, the jury had been revised downwards and only 100 voters, journalists from the 100 best nations in the world ranking, were called upon to express themselves.
The number 9 of the Blues has therefore completely crushed the competition with 549 points out of 558 possible. To find such a gap with Sadio Mané (2nd with 193 points), you have to go back to 1998 and a certain Zinedine Zidane.
In detail, only Egypt, Senegal, the Netherlands and Slovenia did not select it first in their list. It is with the last of them that he obtains his worst ranking… Third behind Kevin De Bruyne and Robert Lewandowski! For KB9, it’s a real plebiscite. Egypt and Senegal played the patriotic card by voting for those who made Liverpool happy last year Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mané.
Mbappé hounded by Courtois
For Kylian Mbappé, 6th place can be debated given his club and selection statistics. Only 42 voters out of 93 placed it in the Top 5 of their ranking. With 85 small points, the PSG striker is relegated to more than 30 points from 5th place Mohamed Salah, and is only 3 points ahead of Thibaut Courtois, just behind him. Bondy’s child is notably 2nd in the list of Ghana and Palestine.
Zero votes for Ronaldo
To browse the rankings a little, they are only 17 players to have collected at least one point. Sebastien Haller and Luiz Diaz benefit in particular from the vote of the journalist from their respective countries (Côte d’Ivoire and Colombia) to go and scratch very small points. Cristiano Ronaldo, meanwhile, received no votes. The Portuguese is the first of the players with 0 points, due to his number of Ballon d’Or nominations, a criterion to decide between the rest of the players.
A bit of a disappointment this year. After narrowing down the number of voters, there aren’t really any wacky Top 5s. In 2019, the Sri Lankan journalist stood out by placing Trent Alexander-Arnold at the top of his votes. It should be noted, however, that three journalists have named the top five in the correct order: the Irishman, the Beninese and the Austrian.