Lionel Messi Wins Eighth Ballon d’Or as Soccer’s Best Player

The Ballon d’Or, essentially the most prestigious particular person soccer award of the yr, rewards the most effective participant over a 12-month interval. But Lionel Messi primarily received it in nearly a month late final yr.

Messi, 36, was awarded the prize on Monday for the eighth time, and the primary time since he signed with Inter Miami of Major League Soccer in July. Aitana Bonmatí of Barcelona and the World Cup-winning Spanish nationwide crew received the ladies’s award for the primary time.

Messi’s exploits in Miami, pretty much as good as they have been, didn’t earn him the award. Rather it was his efficiency in serving to carry Argentina final December to its first World Cup since 1986. Just when it appeared that he would end his profession with out lifting the cup, he helped his nation win the title with seven targets, together with two within the remaining towards France. He received the match’s most useful participant award as properly.

That efficiency kind of locked up the Ballon d’Or 11 months earlier than it was handed to him. In the meantime, he left Paris St.-Germain for a contract with Miami that pays him greater than $50 million a yr, in accordance with stories.

When M.L.S. started play in 1996, the hope, frankly, was merely to outlive in a soccer, baseball and basketball-obsessed nation. Surely few thought that the world’s finest participant could be plying his commerce within the United States by 2023.

Messi earned the Ballon d’Or for his exploits on the World Cup in Qatar, not the Leagues Cup in Miami. Still, the award was a coup for M.L.S., which has already gained worldwide publicity by signing him. Sales of Messi’s pink Inter jersey have skyrocketed worldwide, placing the league on the map in locations it had been little observed earlier than.

Messi’s first six Ballons d’Or got here when he was taking part in for Barcelona, the membership crew he had represented since he was 13. When that membership bumped into monetary issues, he tearfully left for the Qatar-financed P.S.G. Though he received yet one more Ballon d’Or there, his time was largely sad, and it resulted in a bitter divorce.

Then it was on to Miami, the place he hardly appeared like a late-30-something taking part in out the string. He guided Inter to victory within the Leagues Cup, for Mexican and M.L.S. groups, with a tournament-leading 10 targets. But the crew, which had been horrible earlier than his arrival, was buried too deeply within the standings to make the M.L.S. Cup playoffs.

Messi has pronounced himself glad in Miami, although “one never completely adapts to this climate,” he mentioned in August.

The pre-award debate centered on whether or not Messi’s wonderful month on the World Cup ought to trump the advantageous yearlong play of the Norwegian striker Erling Haaland, who received nearly each membership trophy out there with mighty Manchester City. Voters thought it did. Haaland positioned second.

Messi’s eighth Ballon d’Or is one other optimistic tally in his long-running battle for finest participant of his technology with the Portuguese ahead Cristiano Ronaldo, who’s second on the all-time checklist with 5 of the awards, which date to 1956. Ronaldo, 38, now appears unlikely to win any extra, particularly after signing a big-money contract with Al-Nassr within the unheralded Saudi league on the finish of final yr.

This yr’s Ballon d’Or awards, introduced on the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, cowl performances from August 2022 to July 2023. They are decided by the votes of 100 soccer journalists from 100 international locations.

Bonmatí, 25, a midfielder, received the ladies’s Ballon d’Or, after serving to her membership crew, Barcelona, win Europe’s largest match, the Champions League.

She topped that together with her efficiency within the World Cup, which technically occurred exterior the window for which gamers have been judged, scoring three targets and profitable the match’s M.V.P. award as Spain defeated England, 1-0, within the remaining in Sydney in August.

Bonmatí has developed a popularity as a participant who tirelessly seeks enchancment, learning efficiency information, studying and dealing together with her personal health coach, nutritionist and psychologist. “I try to understand everything,” Bonmatí, the daughter of two lecturers in Catalan literature, informed The New York Times in June. “I am a very curious person.”

Her Spain and Barcelona teammate Alexia Putellas, winner of the final two Ballons d’Or, was injured for a lot of the yr.