French magazine announced changes to the award format starting this season
to magazine France Soccer announced Four changes to the Ballon d’Or awards. The trophy given to the best player in the world has already undergone significant changes in the past and will now undergo a few more that, according to the magazine, will make the award fairer.
In 1995, it stopped awarding only Europeans working in Europe and started to put all nationalities in the dispute, but only those who work in the old continent. In 2007 it opened the range to anyone, without restriction.
In 2018, the women’s Ballon d’Or appeared, giving the opportunity for women’s football to have more visibility and due recognition.
Check out the latest Ballon d’Or changes:
Calendar
The awards used the annual calendar (January – December) to analyze the best player. As the biggest competitors operate in Europe, it would not make sense to analyze this way, because the season there works differently. On the mainland, the seasons start in one year and end in the other (August – July). This becomes the new window for analysis for the vote.
Who chooses the final list?
The list of finalists is chosen by journalists who work at the magazine itself, no more. In addition to them, journalists from The Team will be part of the voters. Didier Drogba, ambassador of the awards, and the person who got the most positions in the final list of the best in the world from the previous edition will also be part of the team.
For the next edition, the Vietnamese Truong Anh Ngoc, from the vehicle The Thao & Van Hoawill be present in the vote for hitting the top five in the Golden Ball and the Yashin trophy, for best goalkeeper.
Remembering that this change applies to the choice of 30 men’s football finalists, 20 women’s football, 10 goalkeepers and 10 youngsters.
vote
In the last edition, 170 journalists from all over the world voted to choose the best player in the world. For the magazine, covering all countries can bring incongruity in the votes because some of them do not have a strong football culture.
So, only journalists from the top 100 countries in the FIFA rankings will be able to vote for the men’s Ballon d’Or. In the female, they will be the first 50.
Criteria
Betting on transparency and saying that it has not evolved in this direction in recent years, the France Soccer listed the criteria for choosing the winner. In order of importance, these are the new criteria:
1 – Individual performance and decisive character of the competitor
2 – Collective performance and achievements accumulated during the season
3 – Player class and sense of fair play
