The world's best footballer is a contender for the next big award as Robert Lewandowski is among the nominees for this year's Ballon d'Or. France Football has presented the prestigious award for the best player of the year since 1956, announced the list of 30 candidates for the 2021 vote on Friday evening. The winner of the Ballon d'Or, plus the winners in the other categories, will be crowned on 29 November at a gala in the Théâtre du Chatelet in Paris.
Search for Messi's successor
After his record 41-goal season in the Bundesliga, and winning the Golden Shoe as Europe's top scorer, Lewandowski is certainly one of the hottest contenders for the award. However, the competition is fierce with Europe's Footballer of the Year Jorginho, as well as N'Golo Kante, Cristiano Ronaldo and Mohamed Salah also among the front-runners. The winner will succeed Lionel Messi, who secured the trophy in 2019. Lewandowski finished 8th that year. The Ballon d'Or was not awarded in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Neuer up for the Yashin Trophy
Bayern captain Manuel Neuer is one of the ten nominees for the Yashin Trophy, the vote for the best goalkeeper of the year. The world's best keeper is competing with Italy's European champion Gianluigi Donnarumma and Edouard Mendy of Champions League winners Chelsea, among others, to follow on from Alisson Becker, who was the innaugural winner of the award in November 2019.
Kopa Trophy beckons for Musiala
Shooting star Jamal Musiala has made it onto the shortlist for the Kopa Trophy, the award for the best young player of the year. The ten-man shortlist, selected by former Ballon d'Or winners, also includes three other Bundesliga starlets in Florian Wirtz (Bayer Leverkusen), Jude Bellingham and Giovanni Reyna (both Borussia Dortmund). The last award in 2019 went to Dutchman Matthijs de Ligt.
Lewandowski was honoured in September with the Golden Shoe as Europe's best goal scorer:
Topics of this article