Zinedine Zidane has said that Real Madrid forward Cristiano Ronaldo deserved to beat Franck Ribery and Lionel Messi for the FIFA Ballon d’Or award this season. Ronaldo managed using this coveted award for the second time in his career after having previously done so back in 2008. Since then, he has been beaten by Lionel Messi in the past four seasons. It has developed into one of the infamous rivalries in modern football. The Portuguese managed to win the award by beating Messi and also Ribery, who won three major trophies with Bayern Munich last season.
This has been seen as a better achievement in the eyes of many since football is a team sport, but Ronaldo managed to beat Ribery in every regard according to Zidane. The former French international says that Ronaldo has scored an incredible amount of goals (more than 60) and he has also been responsible for Real Madrid running very close to the league title. Zidane has been working with Ronaldo in close quarters and he says that the Portuguese with the best footballer in the world right now.
Zidane is no stranger to winning the coveted award himself after having done so in 1998. The former French international has confirmed that he wants to get into football management after being roped in as the assistant coach under Carlo Ancelotti.
“We’re not going to cry out that it was a scandal, even if Franck undoubtedly deserved something given the season he had. The difference is certainly the 69 goals Cristiano scored. There are three criteria: what has been done with your club, what you do individually, and the player’s image. For the next time, all of that needs to be clarified, because I think it’s an individual award and it’s above all what the player does on the pitch. Even if Franck has been exceptional, the other scored 69 goals,” Zidane said.