The 2019 Ballon d’Or vote was always unfairly weighted towards Barcelona superstar Lionel Messi, says Demba Ba, with the former Chelsea striker saying his fellow Sengalese Sadio Mane was a more deserving winner.
The ex-Premier League frontman told The Independent of a man recently crowned African Player of the Year: “These days we speak so much about statistics - I believe that he had the individual and collective stats to have won the Ballon d’Or.
“I always said if you swap Mane’s stats in 2019 with Messi’s, Messi still would have won it, even with fewer goals.
“The fact that Mane won the Champions League, the Super Cup, he played an unbelievable season and finished joint top goal-scorer in the Premier League, it’s crazy! Not only that, he was decisive in all of the games. I believe he could’ve won it.”
Ba added: “I’ve had this talk with a lot of players. They say ‘yeah, but Messi is a better player’. Of course, everyone knows that!
“Even if Sadio comes and tells me that he’s better than Messi, I’d slap him in his face and tell him ‘shut up boy, sit down!’ But in 2019, in my perspective, he had a better season.”
Siawo21
663
Lionel Messi, Sadio Mane, Van Dijk, Salah, Firmino all of them played excellent and won trophies but the difference is Messi did it under Ernesto awful Valverde, and trust me that was worth 3000 Ballon d'ors[Crylaugh][Crylaugh][Crylaugh]
FaithEvans
546
But then Sadio Mane wasn't even the best player in the EPL, the Champions League or the AFCON, he wasn't Liverpool's best player of the season either... how could he possibly be the best player in the world?... he even said Messi deserves it! But if he continues on this current trajectory, Liverpool wins the league and got to the latter part of UCL, Mane should better start preparing his balond'OR award show speech
raynknight
382
maybe in different era and a Different universe This one is Messi's and onLy Messi's Mr. Demba Ba
HalfEmpty
373
With the last two Ballon d'or awards, I've found myself at loss concerning the criteria for finding the winners. Is it individual performance? How exactly can we quantify individual performance? Is it by goals? That would unfairly exclude both midfielders and defenders. Then if it isn't about goals scored we need to find more tangible and justifiable criteria. I think it has been based on a person's individual influence on the team performance (extra weight thrown in if the team goes for major honours). That said, the argument really makes sense - Mane was a very important figure for Liverpool and Senegal in their league and cup performances. Sorry, Messi's Barca won nothing of note (which the other nominees didn't win). Truth be told, neither Messi nor CR7 should ha e been awarded (although, seeing trophies won, CR7 probably deserved it more than Messi). The choice should have been between Van Dijk and Mane, who both performed exceptionally at club and international level
Nadan7
265
I blame Modrich who assisted Messi who was offiside [Crylaugh][Crylaugh][Crylaugh]
TBDIPA
254
In 2019, Van Dijk was more deserving than anyone else for Ballon d’Or. This should not have only given to centre forward all the time even if they are not deserving compare to others. Nonsense decision. If the award is not based on yearly performance. It’s better to give Messi and CR7 in every alternative year until they are active. No one can be better than them in overall career performances. I think Ballon d’Or is not based on players performances. This is more fixated with the club, it will go either Real Madrid or Barcelona period. If CR7 was on Real Madrid, I bet Luca Modric wouldn’t have chance in 2018.
Gabby_Smith
250
The eleven greatest players of all time. 1) Lionel Messi 2) Lionel Messi 3) Lionel Messi 4) Lionel Messi 5) Lionel Messi 6) Lionel Messi 7) Lionel Messi 8) Lionel Messi 9) Lionel Messi 10) Lionel Messi 11) Lionel Messi - In That Particular Order