It remains an iconic image in Italy. Fabio Cannavaro lifting the World Cup aloft in Berlin on July 9, 2006 marked the Azzurri’s fourth such triumph. It also came against the backdrop of the Calciopoli scandal back home, with the name of Italian football in the mud.
Cannavaro soon joined Real Madrid, his Juventus side having been demoted to Serie B, and by the winter he would be crowned the best footballer on the planet when named as the winner of the much-coveted Ballon d’Or, beating former Juve teammate Gianluigi Buffon and Arsenal’s Thierry Henry to the honour.
Until Monday night, that was the last time neither Cristiano Ronaldo nor Lionel Messi had made the top three.
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It says much about the golden pair that they have come to dominate the festivities at the annual Ballon d’Or gala. Ronaldo has won five, Messi has collected seven. Between them they won 10 on the trot between 2008 and 2017, while Messi had won the last two on offer either side of the Covid-19 pandemic until Karim Benzema’s success in the 2022 voting was announced on Monday.
But while the Frenchman’s win has been heralded as a changing of the guard similar to that which greeted Luka Modric’s success in 2018, it continues the stranglehold of Barcelona and Real Madrid on the individual award which now stretches back to 2008-09.
Including Benzema, the last 13 recipients of the Ballon d’Or have spent at least part of their award-winning year with one of the Clasico giants. Messi? Six of his titles came as a Barca player, while his seventh was announced just months after he’d left the Camp Nou for Paris Saint-Germain. And since Ronaldo won his first title in 2008 as a Manchester United player, he’s won four with Madrid. The other two winners? Modric and Benzema, both of Los Blancos.
In 2009, 2011, 2012, 2015 and 2017, the entire top three came from Madrid and Barcelona combined, while in 2010 it was a clean sweep of Blaugrana players with Messi beating Andres Iniesta and Xavi Hernandez to first place. Assign three points to the winner, two for second and one for third, and since 2008 Barca stars would have combined for 39 points, Real Madrid 28 and in third would be Liverpool and Manchester United tied on five apiece.
It was actually in 2003 that the Ballon d’Or’s podium last failed to feature a Barcelona or Real Madrid player. Either this truly has been the golden age of the Clasico rivalry or the voters – like the rest of the world – have taken an increasingly narrow view of the definition of world class. Do you have to match the goalscoring tally of peak Messi or Ronaldo to stake a claim for individual honours? Or is it only at the Bernabeu or Camp Nou that you can prove yourself a big-game player?
This is not to diminish Benzema’s achievements. He was indeed the standout player in 2022. But the appearance of players from the same old clubs at the top end of the voting does nobody any good. Manchester City have dominated the Premier League in the last decade with stars such as Sergio Aguero and Vincent Kompany standing out in the sky blue, yet Kevin De Bruyne’s third-place finish on Monday was the first City mention on the podium in the trophy’s 66-year history. What of those who have propelled Bayern Munich to 10 straight titles? And where were Juventus’ superstars when they dominated Serie A for nine years? Oh, that’s right, they had to sign Ronaldo to get a look-in.
Barcelona’s financial fall from grace ought to rule their players out of the running for the golden ball in 2023, but don’t be surprised to see another Real Madrid name come out of an envelope this time next year because that just seems to be the way with the Ballon d’Or.
The Spanish pair account for 13 winners over a spell in which they have combined for eight Champions League titles. Meanwhile, one Premier League player has won it over a 21-year period in which 14 English clubs have reached the UCL final and five have been champions of Europe. And nobody from Germany has lifted the award since Matthias Sammer in 1997 despite Bayern twice winning the European title since then and the Bundesliga supplying five other finalists.
The duopoly of Messi and Ronaldo might be over, but the dominance of Barcelona and Real Madrid – rightly or wrongly – shows no sign of abating.
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