FIFA World Player of the Year Award

In 1991, some 30 years after the Ballon d’Or was first awarded to Sir Stanley Matthews, FIFA commenced the awarding of their own award. The FIFA World Player of the Year.

The award uses a Borda Count system to tally votes. Simply put a Borda count involves voters ranking their candidates in order of preference. Each rank of preference is assigned a certain point  value. Once all the voters have been counted the player with the most points is declared the winner.

Initially voting in the award was restricted to international coaches. Each coach was given three votes, worth five points, three points and one point. Coaches were free to vote on whoever they felt worthy of the title of the World’s Best Player.

This eventually led to some criticism after some rather questionable nominations. FIFA’s response was to provide voters with a shortlist of players to choose from. This change was introduced in 2004. At the same time FIFA expanded the amount of voters to include International Captains and select representatives from FIFPro.

It’s interesting to see FIFPro representatives get votes, effectively this means that they have influence over two of the major individual awards in Football with their own FIFPro award commencing in 2005.

The FIFA award has come under scrutiny due to the fact that it tends to focus mainly on players playing in Europe’s top competition, the UEFA Champions League. Players who have played outside of Europe have in the past been overlooked for nomination. Indeed the only player who has played outside of Europe and been nominated was Juan Roman Riquelme. Even then he only spent half the year playing for Boca Juniors in Argentina, the rest of the year was spent with his Spanish club Villarreal.

Whilst the Footballing world would generally consider the UEFA Champions League to be of a higher standard than it’s South American equivalent the Copa Libertadores. It’s the Copa that has produced the most World Club Champions. I think it’s fair to say that clubs from the South American traditionally took the World Club Championship more seriously than their European counterparts. This is changing though as we’ve seen in recent years, with AC Milan and Manchester United’s recent victories.

Another aspect of the FIFA award which is noteworthy is that since 2001 it’s been the only major award that has been awarded to both men and women. Mia Hamm was the first recipient of the female award.

Since the inception of the men’s award in 1991, Brazilian players have dominated the male awards, winning 8 out of the 18 awards to have been awarded.

Ronaldo and Zidane have won the award three times, likewise Birgit Prinz and Marta have won the female award three times.

The oldest male winner was Fabio Cannavaro who won the 2006 award when he whilst 33, whilst Mia Hamm is the oldest female winner at 30. The youngest male reciepent is Ronaldo who was 20 when he won in 1996, whilst Marta is the youngest female who was also 20 when she won the award for the first time in 2006.

Cristiano Ronaldo is the current holder of the male award, whilst Marta is the current holder of the female award.

Male FIFA World Player of the Year Award:

Year	Rank	Player	Nation	Club
2008	1st	Cristiano Ronaldo	Portugal	Manchester United
	2nd	Lionel Messi	Argentina	FC Barcelona
	3rd	Fernando Torres	Spain	Liverpool
2007	1st	Kaká	Brazil	Milan
	2nd	Lionel Messi	Argentina	FC Barcelona
	3rd	Cristiano Ronaldo	Portugal	Manchester United
2006	1st	Fabio Cannavaro	Italy	Juventus
	2nd	Zinedine Zidane	France	Real Madrid
	3rd	Ronaldinho	Brazil	FC Barcelona
2005	1st	Ronaldinho	Brazil	Barcelona
	2nd	Frank Lampard	England	Chelsea
	3rd	Samuel Eto’o	Cameroon	FC Barcelona
2004	1st	Ronaldinho	Brazil	Barcelona
	2nd	Thierry Henry	France	Arsenal
	3rd	Andriy Shevchenko	Ukraine	Milan
2003	1st	Zinedine Zidane	France	Real Madrid
	2nd	Thierry Henry	France	Arsenal
	3rd	Ronaldo	Brazil	Real Madrid
2002	1st	Ronaldo	Brazil	Real Madrid Internazionale
	2nd	Oliver Kahn	Germany	Bayern Munich
	3rd	Zinedine Zidane	France	Real Madrid
2001	1st	Luís Figo	Portugal	Real Madrid
	2nd	David Beckham	England	Manchester United
	3rd	Raúl	Spain	Real Madrid
2000	1st	Zinedine Zidane	France	Juventus
	2nd	Luís Figo	Portugal	Real Madrid FC Barcelona
	3rd	Rivaldo	Brazil	FC Barcelona
1999	1st	Rivaldo	Brazil	FC Barcelona
	2nd	David Beckham	England	Manchester United
	3rd	Gabriel Batistuta	Argentina	Fiorentina
1998	1st	Zinedine Zidane	France	Juventus
	2nd	Ronaldo	Brazil	Internazionale
	3rd	Davor Šuker	Croatia	Real Madrid
1997	1st	Ronaldo	Brazil	Internazionale FC Barcelona
	2nd	Roberto Carlos	Brazil	Real Madrid
	3rd (tie)	Dennis Bergkamp	Netherlands	Arsenal
		Zinedine Zidane	France	Juventus
1996	1st	Ronaldo	Brazil	FC Barcelona PSV
	2nd	George Weah	Liberia	Milan
	3rd	Alan Shearer	England	Newcastle United Blackburn
1995	1st	George Weah	Liberia	Milan Paris Saint-Germain
	2nd	Paolo Maldini	Italy	Milan
	3rd	Jürgen Klinsmann	Germany	Bayern Munich Tottenham Hotspur
1994	1st	Romário	Brazil	FC Barcelona
	2nd	Hristo Stoichkov	Bulgaria	FC Barcelona
	3rd	Roberto Baggio	Italy	Juventus
1993	1st	Roberto Baggio	Italy	Juventus
	2nd	Romário	Brazil	FC Barcelona
	3rd	Dennis Bergkamp	Netherlands	Internazionale Ajax
1992	1st	Marco van Basten	Netherlands	Milan
	2nd	Hristo Stoichkov	Bulgaria	FC Barcelona
	3rd	Thomas Häßler	Germany	AS Roma
1991	1st	Lothar Matthäus	Germany	Internazionale
	2nd	Jean-Pierre Papin	France	Marseille
	3rd	Gary Lineker	England	Tottenham Hotspur

Female FIFA World Player of the Year Award:

Year	Place	Player	Nationality	Club
2008	1st	Marta	Brazil	Umeå IK
	2nd	Birgit Prinz	Germany	Frankfurt
	3rd	Cristiane	Brazil	Linköpings/ Corinthians
2007	1st	Marta	Brazil	Umeå IK
	2nd	Birgit Prinz	Germany	1. FFC Frankfurt
	3rd	Cristiane	Brazil	VfL Wolfsburg
2006	1st	Marta	Brazil	Umeå IK
	2nd	Kristine Lilly	United States	KIF Örebro DFF
	3rd	Renate Lingor	Germany	1. FFC Frankfurt
2005	1st	Birgit Prinz	Germany	1. FFC Frankfurt
	2nd	Marta	Brazil	Umeå IK
	3rd	Shannon Boxx	United States
2004	1st	Birgit Prinz	Germany	1. FFC Frankfurt
	2nd	Mia Hamm	United States	W. Freedom retired
	3rd	Marta	Brazil	Umeå IK
2003	1st	Birgit Prinz	Germany	1. FFC Frankfurt
	2nd	Mia Hamm	United States	Washington Freedom
	3rd	Hanna Ljungberg	Sweden	Umeå IK
2002	1st	Mia Hamm	United States	Washington Freedom
	2nd	Birgit Prinz	Germany	1. FFC Frankfurt
	3rd	Sun Wen	China PR	Atlanta Beat
2001	1st	Mia Hamm	United States	Washington Freedom
	2nd	Tiffeny Milbrett	United States	New York Power
	3rd	Sun Wen	China PR	Atlanta Beat