The FIFA The Best awards gala for the best of 2021 once again stages a duel between the Argentine Leo Messi and the Polish Robert Lewandowski, who together with the Egyptian Mohamed Salah (Liverpool) aspire to the award for best footballer, while the Spanish Alexia Putellas is presented as the great favorite to be recognized as the best player, who will join the Ballon d’Or.
(You may be interested in: James Rodríguez: Will he return to Everton after the departure of ‘Rafa’ Benítez?)
At a gala to be held at the FIFA headquarters in Zurich, presented by the journalist Reshmin Chowdhury and the former soccer player Jermain Jenas, the German champion’s striker aspires to his second consecutive The Best after once again signing a magnificent year in which he won the Bundesliga and the German Super Cup in addition to scoring 69 goals throughout a calendar year (2021).
He also surpassed Gerd Müller’s historic record after scoring 41 goals in the same season in the Teutonic league.
Will it be for Messi?
Messi, who a few weeks ago won his seventh Ballon d’Or ahead of Lewandowski himself, could win The Best again, an award he won in 2019.
(Also read: Liverpool is reborn and assaults second place)
His service sheet highlights the Copa América that he won with Argentina last summer. However, in his new stage at Paris Saint-Germain, he has not yet shone like at Barcelona, where he presented even more attractive numbers in 2021.
Thanks to them, with 25 league goals, he became the top scorer in the Spanish championship.
Mohamed Salah, who is playing the African Cup in Cameroon, will not contribute titles with his team but on an individual level he was key in Liverpool’s correct season, which finished third in the Premier League, reached the fourth round in the League Cup and in the FA Cup and reached the quarterfinals of the Champions League.
In total, the ‘pharaoh’, who was already third in The Best of 2018, scored 39 goals in a calendar year.
In the women’s category, Alexia Putellas, midfielder for Barcelona and the Spanish national team, emerges as the great favorite ahead of her partner Jenni Hermoso and the Australian from Chelsea Sam Kerr to succeed the English Lucy Bronze in the winners’ list. Putellas, Hermoso and Kerr was the final classification of the recent Ballon d’Or.
The Catalan became the first Spaniard to receive this recognition since Luis Suárez in 1960. She led Barcelona led by Lluis Cortés -also a candidate for best women’s football coach- to achieve the historic League-Champions League-Cup triplet, as well as to an immaculate year of the Spanish team led by Jorge Vilda, who did not know defeat.
best manager
The Spanish Pep Guardiola (Manchester City), winner of the Premier League, the German Thomas Tuchel, who guided Chelsea to the Champions League, and the Italian Roberto Mancini, who led the ‘azzurra’ to obtain the European Championship, are the contenders for the award for best men’s team coach, which in the two previous editions was won by the German Jurgen Klopp (Liverpool), in 2019 ahead of the Catalan.
(Also read: Novak Djokovic without a vaccine: How far does he endanger his career?)
The Best award for the best goalkeeper will be disputed by the Italian Gianluigi Donnarumma (Paris Saint-Germain), the Senegalese Edouard Mendy (Chelsea) and Manuel Neuer (Bayern Munich), who won last year; In the women’s category, the German Ann-Katrin Berger (Chelsea), the Chilean Christiane Endler (Olympique Lyon) and the Canadian Stephanie Lynn Marie Labbé (Paris Saint-Germain) will fight for the same award.
In addition, the finalists for the Puskás award for the best goal are the Argentine Erik Lamela, currently at Sevilla, for his goal with Tottenham against Arsenal in the Premier League; Patrik Schick for the goal he scored with the Czech Republic against Scotland in the European Championship; and the Iranian Mehdi Taremi, for the goal he celebrated with Porto against Chelsea in the Champions League.
The nominees for the Fair Play award are the Danish national team, its medical team and its coaching staff, for their reaction after the cardiac arrest suffered by Christian Eriksen in the match against Finland at the European Championship; Italian coach Claudio Ranieri; and the Scottish player Scott Brown.
The fans of Denmark and Finland, for their behavior on the day of the Eriksen incident; from Germany, for his participation in raising funds for the victims of the floods that caused more than 170 fatalities in the country; and the girl Imogen Papworth-Heidel, for her initiative to raise funds for groups relevant to the British health system during the pandemic, aspire to the prize for the best hobby.
EFE
.
#footballer #Fifa #chooses