The End Of An Era? Messi And Neymar Not Included In Ballon D'Or Award Nominations List

PSG's Lionel Messi. (Photo: Instagram @leomessi)

JAKARTA - Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) star who is also an Argentine national team player, Lionel Messi is not included in the list of nominees for the 2022 Ballon d'Or recipients.

Quoted from Marca, France Football has released a list of 30 nominees for players who will receive the Ballon d'Or award this year. However, Messi's class name does not appear on the list.

Whereas last season La Pulga scored 11 goals from 34 matches with Paris Saint-Germain (PSG). Messi also helped Les Parisien win the Ligue 1 title last season.

With no Messi on the list of nominees for the 2022 Ballon d'Or, it will be the first time since 2005 that the star has failed to make the list. Whereas so far Messi is the record holder of the Ballon d'Or title with seven times a winner.

Not only Messi, his PSG team-mate, Neymar, was also not nominated this year. For Neymar, the reasons are probably quite obvious.

Last season, the Brazilian striker only played 28 times with PSG. Neymar's lack of playing time is motivated by his condition which is often injured, obviously it makes him minimal productivity.

On the other hand, the list of nominations is still filled with the names of other world's top players including Cristiano Ronaldo. The inclusion of Ronaldo in the nomination is the 18th moment he has the opportunity to bring a trophy.

CR7 himself has won the Ballon d'Or five times, this achievement made him the second most trophy-winning player behind Messi.

Besides Ronaldo, the names of players such as Kylian Mbappe, Karim Benzema, Robert Lewandowski, to Virgil van Dijk are also still adorning the 2022 Ballon d'Or nominations.

For the highlight of the event, the winner of the 2022 Ballon d'Or will be announced in Paris, France, on 17 October.

Here is the list of nominees for the 2022 Ballon d'Or:

Thibaut Courtois (Real Madrid, Belgium)

Rafael Leao (AC Milan, Portugal)

Christopher Nkunku (RB Leipzig, France)

Mohamed Salah (Liverpool, Egypt)

Joshua Kimmich (Bayern Munich, Germany)

Trent Alexander-Arnold (Liverpool, England)

Vinicius Junior (Real Madrid, Brazil)

Bernardo Silva (Manchester City, Portugal)

Luis Diaz (Liverpool, Colombia)

Robert Lewandowski (Bayern Munich, Poland)

Riyad Mahrez (Manchester City, Algeria)

Casemiro (Real Madrid, Brazil)

Heung-Min Son (Tottenham, South Korea)

Fabinho (Liverpool, Brazil)

Karim Benzema (Real Madrid, France)

Mike Mainnan (AC Milan, France)

Harry Kane (Tottenham, England)

Darwin Nunez (Liverpool, Uruguay)

Phil Foden (Manchester City, England)

Sadio Mane (Bayern Munich, Senegal)

Sebastien Haller (Borussia Dortmund, Ivory Coast)

Luka Modric (Real Madrid, Croatia)

Antonio Rudiger (Real Madrid, Germany)

Cristiano Ronaldo (Manchester United, Portugal)

Kevin De Bruyne (Manchester City, Belgium)

Dusan Vlahovic (Juventus, Serbia)

Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool, Netherlands)

Joao Cancelo (Manchester City, Portugal)

Kylian Mbappe (PSG, France)

Erling Haaland (Manchester City, Norway)