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Virgil van Dijk, Cristiano Ronaldo and lionel Messi Compose the shortlist for the Men’s Player award – but that need to win it?
Can you distinguish between three players, each having a record of accolades?
We have asked soccer author Andy West football pro Mina Rzouki along with BBC Sport’s chief football writer Phil McNulty to create their case for each of the candidates.
Who would you agree with? Take our vote here and select your own winner. Highlights of the Fifa Football Awards are in 23:05 BST on Monday on BBC One.
Spanish soccer writer Andy West:
Knowing that Lionel Messi is the best player on the planet comes using them to watch soccer , and using eyes.
If you watch him and you are being goal – you will see that Messi will be head and shoulders above everyone else. The ability difference is not even close.
Watch himand the aims will be seen by you. You will observe the dribbles. The supernatural passes, the signature, the 360-degree spatial awareness, the ability. All those things will be seen by you, and you will be forced to admit. Up to now.
Maybe the stats can help, if you don’t trust your eyes reach that decision. You probably already know that Messi scored more league goals than anybody else in Europe at 2018-19 (36, before Kylian Mbappe’s 33). But Messi’s all-round magnificence is represented from the fact he was also one of Europe’s top actors in assists (fifth), opportunities created in open play (third), dribbles completed (fourth), moves into the final third (second) and shots contrary to the fort (first). He’s playmaker a striker and winger all wrapped into one.
Those exploits led with Messi inspiring Barcelona to a comfortably-earned league title, also, to silverware, finishing 11 points before Atletico Madrid.
In addition, he excelled in the Champions League, easily topping the competition’s scoring charts (12). And until you throw Anfield on his face, notice that Messi created more opportunities and had more shots on target than any other participant in that stunning instant leg (like Liverpool gamers ). It is hardly his fault his team-mates forgot the way to finish or shield.
Messi’s problem, and the sole reason the’deserving’ winner of awards such as this is even discussed, is that we take him for granted.
As soon as we see – to mention a game a larger-than-normal number of die-hard fans will probably have witnessed – the unbelievable performance he produced at Wembley past October to ruin a helpless Tottenham defence, we shrug our shoulders and say:”Well, that is Messi.” We’d be in raptures, if that amount was reached by a different participant only once. With Messi, it’s normal.
But the simple fact that he delivers displays of such mind-boggling brilliance 30 or 25 times. He should be appreciated by us while we revel in his unmatched splendour, and can rather than reason that it’s somebody else’s turn. There is not any other best. The best is Messi.
And if you are still not convinced, take heed of an informed opinion in the man who played against him last season:”Messi is still the best player in the world and I believe he deserves it [the award] provided he is playing.”
The words of whose are they? None other than Virgil van Dijk’s.
Even the other major contender for the award thinks it should be won by Messi.
Italian soccer pro Mina Rzouki:
Let us be fair, Ronaldo did not outscore Lionel Messi nor did help Juventus win against the Champions League last season as Virgil van Dijk. Three players outscored the Portuguese Icon and also for the first time under Massimiliano Allegri’s tutelage, Juventus did not win the Coppa Italia.
Why should Ronaldo win the Fifa player of the year?
Although his critics have lots to point to when calculating Ronaldo might not have lived up to the very substantial expectations the five-time Ballon d’Or winner has set for himself, it also needs to be noted precisely how much a difference he left when playing to his nation and new club.
Unlike Messi and Van Dijk, Ronaldo decided a fresh challenge, playing a new league with a new system and fresh team-mates. Under the advice of a trainer that was pragmatic, Ronaldo was tasked with proving worth – and that he did just that. He was called as the most valuable player in the league, so assisting Juventus to win against the Supercoppa but also the Scudetto by being the club’s top scorer and their inspiration.
When changing clubs and leagues, many would boast similar numbers?
This was Ronaldo who scored from the Supercoppa final against Milan to secure the triumph, Ronaldo who secured the outstanding comeback triumph against Atletico Madrid from the Champions League and Ronaldo who rallied the troops to protect critical points against the likes of Napoli and Inter, Juve’s challengers for the name.
As for Portugal, director Fernando Santos confessed to running out of adjectives to describing the player, when it came, settling and aptly labelling him ‘a genius’.
While the nation’s eventual win against the Netherlands has been that the participant’s 30th title in football, ronaldo scored a hat-trick against Switzerland to secure the presence in the inaugural Nations League’s closing of Portugal.
For both club and country Ronaldo has made the distinction, winning each final he played last year. He’s the participant his team-mates have appeared to to inspire them about the pitch but also to inspire them.
BBC chief football writer Phil McNulty:
The finest work of virgil van Dijk may not be magnificent or as eye-catching as Lionel Messi’s or even Cristiano Ronaldo’s – unless you’ve observed Liverpool on a standard basis for the past 12 months.
Van Dijk’s peerless defending, which makes him the very best in the whole world in his own place, stretches back into nearly the minute he arrived in Liverpool for # 75m at January 2018 from Southampton.
He immediately transformed a previously vulnerable Liverpool defence to the scope that they reached the Champions League Final at the end of that season, though even he was helpless to treat the flaws of hapless goalkeeper Loris Karius who played a major role in their 3-1 defeat to Real Madrid in Kiev.
Throw his profession ahead and we have a participant being ranked alongside the central defenders Liverpool have ever had – even the likes of Alan Hansen – and who’s simply irreplaceable in manager Jurgen Klopp’s plans.
And we also carry a participant whose existence, calmness, leadership – and the occasional target such as if he scored a crucial header in the Champions League last 16 second-leg win away to Bayern Munich at the Allianz Arena last season – allowed Liverpool to compensate for that bitter confrontation against Real Madrid by asserting European club football’s biggest prize for the sixth time against Tottenham Hotspur in Madrid in June.
Van Dijk’s level consistency is that if Arsenal’s Nicolas Pepe got the best of him at an individual joust in Liverpool’s 3-1 triumph at Anfield on 24 Augustit had been the first time anyone had dribbled past him at a 50-match sequence stretching back to March 2018.
It’s testimony to how great Van Dijk is and I believe he’ll be a worthy recipient of this Best Award and a truly remarkable statistic.
There was almost an air of incredulity when he left the first error of severe consequence anyone could remember with optimism when his loose backpass enabled Fernando Llorente to seal Napoli’s 2-0 triumph against Liverpool in their first Champions League group match.
YesMessi and Ronaldo have continued unbelievable longevity and degrees of greatness that we might not see again for a generation, but at the past 12 months that the transformative impact of Van Dijk on Liverpool means nobody should whine if he is the winner.
Van Dijk is magnificent in the atmosphere, has the capacity to overpower attackers along with his physical presence, comes with a finely-honed awareness of danger and his assortment of long and short death gives Liverpool an additional dimension for their offensive game.
Quite simply he’s the guardian. He’s played with a role in earning Liverpool the team.
He is the central plank in a group which has won the Champions League, is playing a part in Ronald Koeman’s competition of the Netherlands national side, and is coveted by every club in the world.
Van Dijk, in my view, need to acquire this award.
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Who should win the men’s award in the finest Fifa Football awards???
This vote will close at 18:00 BST on 23 September. You may vote only once.
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