Although there was no Ballon d’Or award this year, FIFA decided to award their ‘The Best’ gong.
Despite not having their best years, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi still found themselves in the top three, this time alongside Bayern Munich’s Robert Lewandowski.
Any other result than the Polish marksman getting the top prize would’ve been a travesty and surely left everyone asking whether there was any merit in them in future.
As it was, Lewandowski was the winner, leaving Messi in third, and a clearly unhappy Ronaldo in second.
With both the Portuguese and Argentinian coming to the end of their careers, it was the first sign that perhaps their time at the top is over.
Whilst that’s probably not in dispute, what caused consternation after the awards was how Messi had voted, per FIFA.com.
There were, arguably, enough Liverpool players that he could’ve picked who would’ve been deserving recipients too, but there were no Reds players in his list to be found.
Instead, Messi plumped for Neymar, Lewandowski and Kylian Mbappe.
Messi’s votes for FIFA THE BEST
1 Neymar
2 Mbappe
3 Lewandowski— Barça Worldwide (@BarcaWorldwide) December 17, 2020
It seems fairly clear, therefore, that the scars from that night in Liverpool still haven’t healed. How else do you explain such a snub?