Just like in the World Cup final, Paris Saint-Germain teammates Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappe go up against one another for The Best FIFA Men\u2019s Player prize for 2022 on Monday, with Ballon d\u2019Or Karim Benzema the other contender.
\nThe ceremony takes place in Paris, and Messi appears as the favourite to add another individual gong to his collection after leading Argentina to glory over Mbappe\u2019s France in that epic encounter in Qatar.
\nMessi has won the Ballon d\u2019Or seven times and claimed the FIFA award \u2014 inaugurated in 2016 following FIFA\u2019s split with Ballon d\u2019Or organisers France Football \u2014 once in 2019.
\nIn the last two years, Messi has made the podium as Robert Lewandowski has won the title, but the 35-year-old\u2019s career-crowning World Cup triumph was the defining moment of 2022.
\nThe winner is decided by a jury comprised of the coach and captain of every men\u2019s national team and one journalist from each country but fans can also vote.
\nMbappe became the first player to score a World Cup final hat-trick since Geoff Hurst in 1966 as he dragged France to a 3-3 draw after extra time \u2014 despite two goals by Messi \u2014 before they eventually succumbed in a shoot-out.
\nMbappe, who turned 24 just after the final, was the tournament\u2019s top scorer with eight goals, one more than Messi, who claimed the Golden Ball for best player.
\nHe was also comfortably PSG\u2019s most important player in the year leading up to the World Cup, despite being joined there by Messi \u2014 he was Ligue 1\u2019s leading scorer and France\u2019s player of the year.
\nHowever, their World Cup achievements overshadow everything else. \u201cBecause Messi won the World Cup he has the biggest chance of winning, that\u2019s a fact,\u201d admitted Ruud Gullit, himself a former Ballon d\u2019Or winner.
\nDutchman Gullit was speaking in his role as a member of the Laureus Academy, which recently included Mbappe and Messi among the nominees for their own awards.
\n\u201cBut I have so much respect for Mbappe. For me, he is on the same level. What he did in the final, to take that responsibility was unbelievable,\u201d he added.
\nPutellas up for women\u2019s gong
\nBenzema\u2019s chances of winning another individual honour were hit after he missed the World Cup due to injury.
\nExiled from the French team for five and a half years because of his involvement in a blackmail scandal over a sex tape involving a former teammate, Benzema\u2019s Ballon d\u2019Or win last October had completed his own career redemption.
\nThe Real Madrid striker, now 35, scored 44 goals in 46 games for his club last season, inspiring them to glory in the Champions League and La Liga. He has continued to bang in the goals this season.
\n\u201cI am really, really proud of my journey,\u201d he declared after claiming the Ballon d\u2019Or.
\nCurrent Ballon d\u2019Or Alexia Putellas, who won the Best award last year, is again nominated for the women\u2019s prize, despite being out since July with a knee injury.
\nEngland forward Beth Mead and US star Alex Morgan are the other finalists. Argentina\u2019s Lionel Scaloni is up for the men\u2019s coach\u2019s honour along with Real Madrid\u2019s Carlo Ancelotti and Manchester City\u2019s Pep Guardiola.
\nSarina Wiegman, who won Euro 2022 with England, is up for the women\u2019s coach award with Sonia Bompastor of Lyon and Brazil\u2019s Pia Sundhage.
\nBrazil star Richarlison\u2019s World Cup strike against Serbia is one of three nominees for the Puskas Award for best goal, named after Hungary great Ferenc Puskas.
\nMarseille\u2019s Dimitri Payet and Polish amputee player Marcin Oleksy are also nominated, while there is also a category for the best male and female goalkeeper.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Just like in the World Cup final, Paris Saint-Germain teammates Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappe go up against one another for The Best FIFA Men\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5025,"comment_status":"registered_only","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5024"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5024\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5025"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}