FIFA Awards: The right and wrong choices for each major award
The FIFA Awards were held on Monday night. While there were multiple great choices, there was also a few that left some scratching their heads.
The FIFA Awards were held in London on Monday night. Here we take a look at who won some of mains awards, and who should have won instead, beginning with The Best FIFA Men’s Player.
The Best FIFA Men’s Player
The winner: Cristiano Ronaldo
Finalists: Lionel Messi and Neymar
This isn’t to argue against Ronaldo winning it, because that would be foolish. This is to argue that both Messi and Neymar could have, or should have, won the award themselves.
Ronaldo did what he does best in 2017: score goals. In 42 matches between La Liga and the Champions League he scored 37. Par for the course for someone who has made a legendary career off bagging goals for fun.
He is, however, off to a bit of a slow start, relative to his standards, in league play this season. Through five games he only has a single goal. He has balanced this out with five goals in three Champions League matches. Still, his scoring, or lack thereof, so far in La Liga has opened the window for debate.
If Ronald wasn’t going to win it, Messi should have. Last season, the Argentine appeared in 53 matches between the same two competitions as Ronaldo, scoring 48 times in the process. This gives Messi a higher scoring rate than Ronaldo.
On top of that, he’s performing magnificently so far this season. He ‘ currently leading the La Liga in goals (11) and assists (three) through his nine matches. He also has three goals in three Champions League matches, recently breaking the 100-goal mark for his European career.
While Neymar deserved to be in the company of Messi and Ronaldo, it just isn’t quite his time. His move to Paris Saint-Germain shows his ambition to prove he’s a truly top talent on his own, and it should pay off sometime in the very near future.
As said above, Ronaldo had a great season, but the award could have just as easily gone to Messi.
The Best FIFA Goalkeeper
Winner: Gianluigi Buffon
Other Finalists: Keylor Navas and Manuel Neuer
This is a bit of an odd one. All three finalists had fantastic years. Of these three, Buffon was likely the most deserving, and the performances of Navas made him a close second in the opinions of many.
The biggest problem with this award was the absence of David De Gea among the finalist. While De Gea’s case was hurt by Manchester United’s sixth-place Premier League finish last season, he’s been one if the best three goalies in the world for several seasons.
De Gea was undeniably the reason they didn’t finish even lower than they did. He has displayed, on multiple occasions, that he’s arguably the best goalkeeper on earth. He’s one of the most, if not the most, athletic in the top tier of goalkeepers.
Perhaps De Gea shouldn’t have won the award, but excluding him from the top three seems an interesting decision, even despite United not finishing in the top four in England.
Despite the arguments against some of the awards handed out on the night, there were a few that were the correct decision.
The Best FIFA Women’s Coach
Winner: Sarina Wiegman
Other Finalists: Nils Nielsen and Gerard Precheur
Wiegman led the Netherlands women’s team to the UEFA Women’s EURO 2017 title. This was the first time in their history that they had won the tournament, and they ended the run of six consecutive wins for Germany.
Wiegman led the Netherlands team past Sweden, England and Denmark, playing a high-paced, attractive and attacking-minded style of soccer that was a joy to watch for everyone who tuned in.
It’s because of this success and how they have played under Wiegman that the Netherlands made a five-spot jump in the most recent world rankings up to seventh in the world.
FIFPRO World 11
The FIFPRO World 11 was mostly as expected, but the inclusion of Andres Iniesta was something of a head-scratcher.
The 33-year-old midfielder made 23 league appearances for Barcelona last season, with only 13 of them coming as starts. He didn’t score a single goal and only had three assists on the season. And in his eight appearances in the Champions League, he had one goal and one assist.
The decision makes little to no sense. There are plenty of other midfielders out there that deserved a pick over him, with some of them receiving nominations in the Best FIFA Men’s Player.
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Another option for inclusion would have been N’Golo Kante. Kante was pivotal in Chelsea’s title-winning season. He made 35 appearances in the league in his first season there, and he was one of the main reasons Chelsea were so difficult to break down defensively.
It’s hard to argue that someone who only made 13 starts for a team who didn’t win their league title deserved a spot over someone who made 35 starts for a title winner and was a massively important cog in the machine.