The battle of being the world’s best player ended Monday night when FIFA officially crowned its highly admired Ballon d’Or award to 29-year-old Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo who also won it last year. He along with Barcelona’s Lionel Messi and Bayern Munich goalkeeper Manuel Neuer were in the race for the biggest soccer title and expectedly won it. Last few weeks have been little bit skeptical about the possible winner especially as far German goalie Manuel Neuer is concerned coz many experts were betting over him to win this year title and even governing body president had said over several occasions that he sees a German winning this year Ballon d’Or but nothing could halt Ronaldo taking his much deserving reward in the stars studded night. This is his third one in the career, earlier he won it back in 2008 and 2013 and now he fast moving to catch his arch rival Argentine Messi who has won this crown four times in his career.
Real Madrid forward got around 37 percent of total voting while Messi was named as the runner up and Manuel Neuer has to settle on the third position. If we look at last year performance of the former world’s priciest player, he netted 61 goals last season including 17 in the Championship league which is a record and helped his side win tenth European title. What former Manchester United star said in his thanksgiving speech, is, “I would like to thank all of those who voted for me. It has been an incredible year. I would like to continue the work that I have done so far. I want to try to improve, to become better as each day goes by. I never thought that I would bring this trophy back home on three occasions. I want to become one of the greatest players of all time. Of course, this requires a lot of effort and I hope to get there. It has been an unforgettable year.”
Messi and Ronaldo have ever been close rivals to each other and often one followed by another in any title race. While Barca star won the Golden Ball award in Brazil, it was Ronaldo turn to return the favor and he did it in style. Apart from this, Messi is as well the highest goals scorer in La Liga and UEFA championship although Ronaldo is fast catching him over there too!