{"id":2803,"date":"2023-01-06T18:08:23","date_gmt":"2023-01-06T18:08:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/?p=2803"},"modified":"2024-04-26T17:41:43","modified_gmt":"2024-04-26T17:41:43","slug":"lionel-messi-favorite-to-scoop-eighth-ballon-dor-following-argentinas-fifa-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/lionel-messi-favorite-to-scoop-eighth-ballon-dor-following-argentinas-fifa-world-cup\/","title":{"rendered":"Lionel Messi favorite to scoop eighth Ballon d’Or following Argentina’s FIFA World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Lionel
Lionel Messi<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The most prolific Ballon d\u2019Or victor in the famous \u2018Golden Ball\u2019s\u2019 prestigious history; Lionel Messi<\/a>, is the current outlying favorite to win the award for a whopping eighth go round, after guiding Argentina to a FIFA World Cup win in Qatar against holders, France.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Messi, who captained his national side to FIFA World Cup glory last month in the dessert in a Qatar-hosted Coupe du Monde, managed to not just convert from the spot in the resulting penalty shoot out \u2013 but managed to net twice himself in regulation time, despite a hat trick of goals from Parisian teammate, Kylian Mbappe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Argentine star has won the prestigious Ballon d\u2019Or on a staggering four separate occasions already during an unrivaled professional career \u2013 spanning the youth setup in his native Argentina, as well as a gold laden spell at FC Barcelona, before a surprising move to Paris Saint Germain. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Landing a spectacular seven Ballon d\u2019Or wins between 2009 and 2021, Messi first achieved the award as part of a phenomenal FC Barcelona side, minting themselves as European Champions with a Rome win over Manchester United.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the time since, Messi has stood proud of the often-compared Cristiano Ronaldo, with the Portuguese native himself netting five Ballon d\u2019Or titles \u2013 two proud of the following trio of Michel Platini, Johan Cruyff, and Marco van Basten. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time of publication, bookies and markets place Messi as short as 2\/7 to win a staggering eighth Ballon d\u2019Or award, far ahead of Kylian Mbappe (7\/2), Erling Haaland (11\/1), and Robert Lewandowski (22\/1) \u2013 who would all land their maidan award should their gazump outright favorite, Messi. \u00a320 no deposit bonus<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Messi\u2019s height continues to rise as he looks to land yet another Ballon d\u2019Or triumph, the Argentine\u2019s next closest rival to the award; Cristiano Ronaldo, has been put out to pasture by many within the footballing world \u2013 trading Manchester United for a shock move to Saudi Arabian side, Al-Nassr recently, following Portugal\u2019s exit from the FIFA World Cup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Set to land a ludicrous wage in a move to the Middle East, the ageing forward, who left Old Trafford and Erik ten Hag\u2019s side on less than gentle terms \u2013 has been ridiculed for his big-money deal with the club, considering Saudi Arabia\u2019s well-documented string of human rights violations, and attempt at sports washing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Messi\u2019s continuance at the precipice of modern-day football, competing in a Paris Saint Germain side who look to topple Europe\u2019s elite for the first time and clinch a UEFA Champions League crown this season, paired with his heralded capture of an elusive World Cup for the first time since the passing of Diego<\/em>, has already separated him firmly in many\u2019s eyes from Ronaldo. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Expected to land a first Ballon d\u2019Or since a spirited effort from Real Madrid frontman and French international, Karim Benzema last year, in what proved to be a UEFA Champions League winning season for Los Blancos<\/em>, Messi has also been tipped to land a gleaming, Super Ballon d\u2019Or \u2013 which has only previously been awarded to Alfredo di Stefano back in 1989, who guided Madrid to five consecutive European Cups.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The most prolific Ballon d\u2019Or victor in the famous \u2018Golden Ball\u2019s\u2019 prestigious history; Lionel Messi, is the current outlying favorite to win the award for a whopping eighth go round, after guiding Argentina to a FIFA World Cup win in Qatar against holders, France. Messi, who captained his national side to FIFA World Cup glory…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":2804,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_kadence_starter_templates_imported_post":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[325,1],"tags":[363,351,364],"class_list":["post-2803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-soccer","tag-fifa-ballon-dor","tag-fifa-world-cup","tag-lionel-messi"],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":325,"label":"News"},{"value":1,"label":"Soccer"}],"post_tag":[{"value":363,"label":"FIFA Ballon d'Or"},{"value":351,"label":"FIFA World Cup"},{"value":364,"label":"Lionel Messi"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/Collage-Maker-05-Jan-2023-11.46-PM-1024x536.jpg",1024,536,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"Ross Markey","author_link":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/author\/rossmarkey\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":325,"name":"News","slug":"news","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":325,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":155,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":325,"category_count":155,"category_description":"","cat_name":"News","category_nicename":"news","category_parent":0},{"term_id":1,"name":"Soccer","slug":"soccer","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":1,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":504,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":1,"category_count":504,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Soccer","category_nicename":"soccer","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":[{"term_id":363,"name":"FIFA Ballon d'Or","slug":"fifa-ballon-dor","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":363,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":1,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":351,"name":"FIFA World Cup","slug":"fifa-world-cup","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":351,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":7,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":364,"name":"Lionel Messi","slug":"lionel-messi","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":364,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":2,"filter":"raw"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2803"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2803\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4011,"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2803\/revisions\/4011"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soccerballworld.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}