Messi, Cristiano, Mbappé, Salah and Mané in The Best shortlist
Liverpool is the club with the most candidates in the list for FIFA’s player of the year award. Harry Kane, De Jong and Eden Hazard are also in the list.
The shortlist of 10 players who have been nominated for this year’s The Best award was announced this afternoon. Last year’s winner Luka Modric was excluded this time – as was Antoine Griezmann.
Three members of Liverpool’s Champions League-winning side – Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mané and Virgil van Dijk are up for the award. Jürgen Klopp’s team have the most candidates in this edition of the award, organized by FIFA and which goes to the world’s best player of the past 12 months. Van Dijk and Matthijs de Ligt are the only defenders in the shortlist, the rest being forwards or midfielders.
The nominees have been selected by two expert panels, one for the Men's and Women's category respectively, "based on their on-field performance and overall behaviour on and off the pitch".
Men’s category
In the Men’s category for The Best, the list reads: Lionel Messi (Argentina), Frenkie de Jong (Holland), Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal), Matthijs de Ligt (Holland), Eden Hazard (Belgium), Harry Kane (England), Sadio Mané (Senegal), Kylian Mbappé (France), Mohamed Salah (Egypt) and Virgil van Dijk (Holland).
Women's category
Unsurprisingly, the recently crowned world champions, the United States Women's team dominates the women's category with four candidates in the list of 12 - Julie Ertz, Rose Lavelle, Alex Morgan and Megan Rapinoe. England, Norway and France have two nominees each in the list and Holland and Australia have a player each.
The full list reads:
Lucy Bronze (England), Julie Ertz (USA), Caroline Graham Hansen (Norway), Ada Hegerberg (Norway), Amandine Henry (France), Sam Kerr (Australia), Rose Lavelle (USA), Vivianne Miedema (Holland), Alex Morgan (USA), Megan Rapinoe (USA), Wendie Renard (France) and Ellen White (England.
Voting for The Best
Votes will be taken from four separate categories - national team coaches, national team captains, a selection of international journalists and the general public who can cast their vote through fifa.com.
Voting is open until midnight CEST on Monday 19 August 2019. The awards gala will take place in Milan, Italy on 23 September.