Madrid’s finest picks up sympathy vote and Ballon d’Or

Cristiano Ronaldo is a sensitive soul. As Sepp Blatter discovered last October, it is unwise to make fun about how much an actor spends on his appearance.

Perhaps the Fifa president now deserves a word of thanks, for Ronaldo may have benefited from a small sympathy vote, as well as his astonishing scoring record, in carrying off the Ballon D’Or award for 2013.

Perhaps stimulated by Blatter’s little dig at his vanity he launched into a stunning scoring sequence of 15 in eight games, crowned by the four play-off goals that took Portugal to the World Cup finals. To have scored 36 times halfway through the season is astonishing.