Tomos Millward
On October 28th in Paris, the 2024 Ballon d’Or awards should have signalled an uncontroversial entrance into a new era of the award’s lifetime. Following Lionel Messi’s record eighth victory in 2023 and effective retirement from high-level football in Miami, France Football had the simple task of granting the award to the most deserving of candidates: Manchester City and Spain midfielder Rodri. Despite this, Rodri’s victory has been met with a wave of criticism, primarily emanating out of Madrid and Brazilian quarters, following the apparent ‘snub’ of 24-year-old Vinicius Junior. This claim is not only inaccurate and has overshadowed a clearly deserving winner but has also reflected poorly on the self-proclaimed ‘biggest club in the world’, the Brazilian winger, and the sport as a whole. This article will explore why Rodri was such a deserving winner, and Vinicius Jr and his club’s deplorable reaction.
Rodri’s deserved victory:
Rodri is “a perfect computer, who administers everything, the emotions, all the moments in a magisterial way; that’s a great help for everyone.”
Rodri has been the greatest footballer in the world over the past 12 months. He has been the most important player for the best team in the world and was pivotal to a revitalised Spain’s European Championship victory. Rodri was not only a stabilising influence in both teams in terms of his defensive and off-the-ball work, but he also improved his game offensively providing 12 goals and 15 assists and creating 114 chances in 63 appearances. Perhaps the best way to showcase Rodri’s importance to the best team in Europe, Champions League defeat notwithstanding, is to examine Guardiola’s team without him. Without Rodri, City lost three of four games last Premier League season. His international manager, Luis de la Fuente, stated Rodri is “a perfect computer, who administers everything, the emotions, all the moments in a magisterial way; that’s a great help for everyone.” For any impartial observer of the past year of football, going beyond statistics, anecdotes, and trophies, Rodri has been head and shoulders above any other player in the world.
Why Vinicius Jr lost:
Why Vinicius Jr lost is obvious. Despite scoring in the Champions League final, the Brazilian winger only scored 15 times and assisted 6 times in 26 La Liga appearances last season and, at odds with the popular perception of the player, was in the bottom third for successful take-ons. He also failed to impress for a Brazil team who scraped through their Copa America group before losing to Uruguay on penalties in the quarter final. Despite some unfounded claims from certain quarters that Vinicius Jr lost the award due to his fight against racism in the sport, the more likely non-footballing reason for his failure to win the Ballon d’Or is due to his confrontational attitude on the pitch. The Ballon d’Or is voted for by a collection of journalists and, according to France Football themselves, factors in a player’s character and their “class and fair play”. Instances where Vinicius Jr has come across as both unlikeable and unsportsmanlike, such as his blatant timewasting and confrontation with Joshua Kimmich in the Champions League semi-final and brash altercation alongside Jude Bellingham with referee Jesus Gil Manzano in March of this year, will have hindered his chances. Whilst Rodri was the deserving winner regardless, instances such as these not only reflect poorly on the player himself, but also make it less likely reporters will want to vote for the him in the future.
He also failed to impress for a Brazil team who scraped through their Copa America group before losing to Uruguay on penalties in the quarter final.
The Reaction:
Vinicius then tweeted “Eu farei 10x se for preciso. Else nao estao preparados.”, translating to “I’ll do it 10x if I have to, They’re not ready.”
Both Real Madrid and Vinicius Jr himself have undermined and spoilt what should have been Rodri’s crowning moment. Following Los Blancos’ seismic and shocking 4-0 loss at home in last weekend’s El Clasico, on Sunday night the club decided to cancel their trip to Paris for the Ballon d’Or ceremony. Prior to this, the 36-time La Liga winners fully expected the award to be presented to Vinicius Jr and, if this were not the case, to their full-back Dani Carvajal or even England’s Jude Bellingham. The club ended up cancelling a delegation of up to 50 people from attending and, much to his own disappointment, Vinicius Jr cancelled his own plans for the evening and Nike cancelled special boots they had prepared for his victory. Vinicius then tweeted “Eu farei 10x se for preciso. Else nao estao preparados.”, translating to “I’ll do it 10x if I have to, They’re not ready.”
In spite of most of the footballing world’s understanding of or support for Rodri’s victory, Real Madrid players also took to social media to voice their anger. French international Eduardo Camavinga wrote: “FOOTBALL POLITICS. My brother you are the best player in the world and no award can say otherwise, Love you my bro” and Tottenham’s Richarlison also bizarrely got involved, decrying the award as “embarrassing”. Vinicus Jr’s reaction is not only embarrassing in isolation, but the aforementioned context where he was fortunate to even place second makes his juvenile tantrums look even worse.
Carlo Ancelotti was named ‘Men’s Coach of the Year’, despite Xabi Alonso’s unprecedented unbeaten season with Bayer Leverkusen.
Real Madrid’s reprehensible reaction is also worsened by context. Not only do Madrid claim to be the biggest club in the world, but their reaction makes little sense given their current and historic success in France Football’s awards. For instance, this year they were crowned ‘Club of the Year’ at the awards ceremony and Carlo Ancelotti was named ‘Men’s Coach of the Year’, despite Xabi Alonso’s unprecedented unbeaten season with Bayer Leverkusen. Add to this Madrid’s haul of previous winners including Cristiano Ronaldo, who was often treated generously at the awards, Karim Benzema, and (questionably) Luka Modric, and the entire club’s reaction appears baffling.
The worst result from Vinicius Jr and Real Madrid’s childish antics is that it has overshadowed Rodri’s thoroughly deserved victory. Rodri’s position is not one that is usually singled out for individual awards but is of vital importance in football. Due to this, his victory should be sweetened even more instead of being overshadowed by a player and institution with overinflated egos and an entitled attitude.
Tomos Millward
Featured image courtesy of [@dmjdenise] via [Unsplash]. Image use license found here (Unsplash). No changes were made to this image.
In article image 1 courtesy of [mancity] via [Instagram]. No changes were made to this image.
In article image 2 courtesy of [sefutbol] via [Instagram]. No changes were made to this image.
In article image 3 courtesy of [mrancelotti] via [Instagram]. No changes were made to this image.
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