Publications
Partners
Cape Town - FIFA's The Best gala proved to be the strangest football award ceremony in recent memory after a series of controversial choices leaving many scratching their heads.
Here Sport24 dissects all the winners:
FIFpro World XI
FIFA has explained how the voting for the player and coach categories took place - national team captains, national team managers, selected journalists and, for the first time, an online poll of fans, with each accounting for 25% of the total.
Despite coming in at third for The Best Men's Player award, Egypt's Mohamed Salah somehow failed to make the FIFPro World XI. The Liverpool attacker scored 32 league goals to finish behind only Lionel Messi in the European scoring charts but was overlooked in favour of Kylian Mbappe and Eden Hazard who both finished behind him in the best men's player list.
?? ALERT ?? @FIFPro & @FIFAcom proudly present the #World11 of 2018! ?? ??
— FIFPro (@FIFPro) September 24, 2018
Well done to all players that have been selected! ??
????https://t.co/DGHqVqhmrf#TheBest #FIFAFootballAwards pic.twitter.com/gxxsQ3Juc9
Belgium goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois, who was named as The Best goalkeeper, also failed to make the team with Spaniard David de Gea preferred.
Congratulations, Thibaut Courtois ??
— #TheBest (@FIFAcom) September 24, 2018
Winner of #TheBest FIFA Goalkeeper 2018 ??#FIFAFootballAwards pic.twitter.com/N1XVG9uYTf
With a greater emphasis placed on the 2018 FIFA World Cup in deciding the winners of The Best awards, Dani Alves, who missed the tournament through injury was somehow named yet again as the best right-back. The Brazilian has been selected in eight of the past nine teams.
FIFPro decided to release four 'reserve' team XI's of players who missed out on the first XI with some interesting results.
The third XI includes Frenchman Antoine Griezmann who misses out on the previous two teams despite being a Soccer World Cup winner and finishing sixth in the men's individual list.
Puskas Award:
The strangest decision of the night can only be explained by the fact that the award is voted for completely by fans. Salah's Merseyside derby goal received a whopping 38% of votes to win the Puskas Best Goal Award. The Egyptian's goal was favoured over both Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale's spectacular overhead-kick efforts in the Champions League. Salah was named as having scored the best goal in 2018 despite his goal not being named as the Premier League Goal of the Month for December 2017.
Which goal is your favourite FIFA Puskas Award winner?pic.twitter.com/8hgQZROOl7
— talkSPORTDrive (@talkSPORTDrive) September 25, 2018
Fans voted Salah's shot the top goal out of a shortlist of 10, which also included Benjamin Pavard's sublime finish for France at the World Cup, Portuguese Ricardo Quaresma's outside-of-the-foot curler against Iran and Cristiano Ronaldo's aerial effort for Real Madrid against his new club Juventus in the Champions League.
Congrats @MoSalah on your 7th best goal from last season winning goal of the year ?? #Baller#Topbin#oneofmanyworldies https://t.co/OkNMlIsNLb
— James Milner (@JamesMilner) September 24, 2018
The Best FIFA Women's Coach was also won by... a man! Reynald Pedros who led the Lyon women's team to their third straight UEFA Women's Champions League.
Congratulations, Reynald Pedros ??
— FIFA Women's World Cup ???? (@FIFAWWC) September 24, 2018
Winner of #TheBest FIFA Women's Coach 2018 ??#FIFAFootballAwards pic.twitter.com/dKDXBHW3km
