Little bit of magic proves Messi the main man again

When Cristiano Ronaldo collected his third Ballon d’Or in January, it was to almost universal acclaim, based on a recognition that the award had indeed gone to the greatest player on earth in 2014, as evidenced by his Champions League medal and a staggering 56 goals for Real Madrid.

I say almost universal acclaim because his great rival Messi didn’t even have him in his top three, demonstrating instead a pronounced club and country bias by choosing Andres Iniesta, Javier Mascherano and Angel Di Maria. But then, Ronaldo himself was even more restrictive in his choice, pointedly favouring Real by naming team-mates Sergio Ramos, Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema as his leading men.

That voting in the Ballon d’Or can rival Eurovision in the self-interest and face-slapping stakes comes as no surprise, still less the fact that Messi and Ronaldo are hardly top of each other’s Christmas card lists.