BY TIM PARSONS
Legendary footballer, Lionel Messi won the Ballon d’or award for the best world’s player for the 5th time in a remarkable achievement.
Amazingly, Messi was diagnosed with a growth hormone deficiency as a child, and relocated to Spain to join Barcelona who agreed to finance his medical treatment.
The 28-year-old Argentine attained 41.33% of the vote, with Real Madrid forward Cristiano Ronaldo (27.76%) coming second, and Barca’s Neymar (7.86%) third.
Remarkably, both Messi and Ronaldo, have shared the past eight awards, with the latter winning it three times. Messi, an excellent striker who scored 52 goals in 61 games, and was top scorer in this years La giga, levelling his team mate, Luis Suarez, with 15 goals. He scored in all 6 tournaments last year, directly contributing to Barcelona’s victory in five of those tournaments. At the tender age of six, he joined the Rosario’s Newell’s old boy’s club, scoring approximately 500 goals in the six years during which he played for them. His team was called ”the machine of 87”, named after the year the team players were born.
Long considered one of the best players of all time, Messi is the only player in history to win the FIFA Ballon d’or five times, and the first to win three European Golden Shoes. For his Barcelonian team, he has seven La Liga titles, and four UEFA champion league titles as well as three Copa del Rey titles. Amazingly, Messi was diagnosed with a growth hormone deficiency as a child and relocated to Spain to join Barcelona who agreed to finance his medical treatment.
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He began his competitive matches at the early age of 17 in 2004 and quickly ascended to great heights in the three years to follow, finishing as a finalist in 2007 for both the Balloon d’or and FIFA world player of the year award, leaving the second winner behind my miles in overall votes. Representing his country in six major tournaments, he won the 2006 FIFA youth championships at youth level, closing the tournament as best player and top scorer, and topping this with an olympic gold medal in the 2008 olympic games, after being named young player of the tournament in the final of the 2007 Copa America.
A left footed dribbler, parallels have been drawn between Messi and Diego Maradona- the Argentinian genius, whose notorious hand of God goal unfairly dumped England out of the world cup in 1986. Maradona actually declared Messi as his successor, and it remains a matter of opinion and debate, who was actually the better player between the two. As captain of the Argentinian squad since 2011, he led his team to the 2014 world cup final and the 2015 Copa America, and was voted player of the tournament on both occasions.
Following the announcement of his fifth win, Messi said:
“It’s a very special moment for me to be back here on this stage, winning again another Ballon d’Or after seeing Cristiano win it,” Messi said.
“It’s incredible that it’s my fifth, much more than anything I would have dreamed of as a kid.”
We hail a true legend, and hope many aspiring footballers and professional aim to match his achievements. It will be very hard, but here is a true role model.
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