For almost 15 years, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo made the Ballon d’Or—football’s most prestigious individual award—their own private battleground. The duo dominated the game, scored goals, broke records and won almost every major title there was. Most importantly, they did their talking on the pitch.
This year, the battle feels different.
After the fierce competition between two all-time greats, we now have a “beg-to-beg” competition between French striker Kylian Mbappe and Spanish winger Lamine Yamal. Both are self-advocating their brilliance in the media, claiming they have done enough to win the award.
Their individual brilliance is undeniable, and the numbers speak for themselves. But when those individual achievements are measured against their teams’ actual success, the tall claims become a little harder to swallow.
Have they actually done enough to deserve the Ballon d’Or?
Weak case for Yamal and Mbappe
Yamal’s Ballon d’Or claim is heavily built around Spain’s World Cup triumph, but his individual numbers at the tournament leave a lot to be desired. He finished the World Cup with just one goal and one assist. Of course, context matters. Yamal entered the tournament after recovering from an injury and following an exhausting season with Barcelona, where he was a key figure in their domestic success, scoring 16 goals and providing 12 assists.
While he was the player of the season in La Liga, Barcelona’s biggest ambition — winning the Champions League — remained an unfulfilled dream since 2015. They were knocked out in the quarter-finals by Diego Simeone’s Atlético Madrid. So, when we look at Yamal’s entire season rather than just the World Cup and Spain’s success, does his resume truly make him the standout player of the year? No, it doesn’t.
Then there is Mbappé, whose case is almost entirely built around his numbers. And this is where the debate becomes particularly interesting.
Mbappé finished as the top scorer across all major competitions with 58 goals for club and country: 25 in La Liga, 15 in the Champions League and 10 for France at the World Cup.
On paper, those numbers are extraordinary. But let’s put these numbers into perspective.
Mbappé scored 25 goals in La Liga, but only 17 came from open play — fewer than Vedat Muriqi of Mallorca, whose side was relegated last season. In the Champions League, Mbappé won the Golden Boot with 15 goals, but 13 of those came during the initial league phase, against opponents such as Benfica, Marseille, Kairat, Monaco and Olympiacos.
His World Cup campaign, however, is much harder to question. He won the Golden Boot after scoring 10 goals. But even that achievement came with a caveat: his final goal tally was boosted by his hat-trick in the third-place play-off against England, a match English forward Harry Kane did not play.
And then there is the bigger picture: Mbappé ended another season without a major trophy.
That makes his own claim particularly fascinating. Mbappé has said: “For years, I’ve considered myself the best player in the world. I haven’t seen anyone better than me.” He also said he would accept Messi or Ronaldo winning the Ballon d’Or, but he would not have swapped places with anyone else who has won it.
But would the recent winners have wanted to swap places with him?
Would Luka Modrić, who led Croatia to a historic World Cup Final in 2018, have traded his Ballon d’Or for Mbappé’s goals? Would Karim Benzema, Rodri or Ousmane Dembélé? Would they have exchanged their trophies, titles and defining moments for individual numbers?
That, for me, is where the Ballon d’Or debate becomes more complicated.
Also read: Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portugal exit is another selfish tantrum. He is ruining his legacy
Goals alone won’t suffice
Individual numbers matter, goals matter. But football is ultimately a team sport, and individual brilliance becomes far more significant when it is backed by collective success — unless the numbers are so extraordinary that they become impossible to ignore, like Messi’s 91 goals in 2012.
This isn’t an argument against Mbappé. His numbers are remarkable, and his World Cup campaign was exceptional. But after almost a decade at the very top of football, his defining achievement remains the 2018 World Cup.
Let’s remember Mbappe plays for two of the biggest teams in Real Madrid and France, where numbers should also translate into the team’s achievements.
Because if goals alone are supposed to be the strongest argument for the Ballon d’Or, then why isn’t Harry Kane making the same case?
Kane has scored 73 goals across all competitions this season — 15 more than Mbappe.
Meanwhile, many are backing Messi to win it for the record ninth time after a magical World Cup run from the little maestro at the age of 39. Messi scored eight goals and provided four assists—two of which came against England in the semi-finals. At 39, Messi once again showed why he’s still in contention for the golden ball.
Although the award is slowly losing its credibility, and with this being the World Cup year, the winner will surely be scrutinised. The debate and claims are only going to catch fire as there are no clear favourites this time. But the self-advocacy outburst of Mbappe and Yamal is surely a bit too far from what they managed to achieve. While Yamal’s Spain and Barcelona bested Mbappe’s France and Real Madrid, this doesn’t mean that he was the point of difference every time the two met on the field.
While Harry Kane also failed to secure anything big with his team and Messi is not playing in Europe, it’ll be interesting to see who takes home the award on 26 October.
(Edited by Saptak Datta)