The Ballon d’Or is the most sought-after individual award in football.
Now, it’s fair to say that since Cristiano Ronaldo’s first win all the way back in 2008, the award has just been a contest between himself and Lionel Messi, with only three other players – Luka Modric, Karim Benzema and Rodri – able to beat them to it.
With that in mind, Football FanCast has created a list of the best players to have never won the award.
11 Honourable mentions: Pele and Diego Maradona
Over 1,500 goals between them; zero Ballon d’Or awards.
Before we get into the list proper, we thought it would be fitting to include two of the greatest footballers to ever live in Pelé and Diego Maradona.
There is no doubt that both of these superstars should have won a Ballon d’Or during their storied careers, and they almost certainly would have done, were it not for an irritating rule in place until 1995.
That rule stipulated that only European players could win the Ballon d’Or, and so neither Pelé nor Maradona were ever eligible to win it when they were playing.
The Brazilian icon was awarded an honorary Ballon d’Or trophy in 2014, but even that doesn’t make up for the fact that he never received one during his playing days.
Pelé and Maradona’s career in numbers:
Pelé
1,363
1,281
26
Maradona
680
344
11
10 Wesley Sneijder
Champions League winner 2009/10
Kicking off our list of the ten players who should have won the Ballon d’Or is Netherlands star Wesley Sneijder.
The Dutch magician was one of the best players in world football during the 2010s, so for him to finish in the top ten for the award only once in his career is a travesty. Now, we aren’t saying that there were several years in which he should have won the award, but there was undoubtedly one season in which we reckon he should have gotten his hands on that golden ball: 2010.
That year, the midfield magician played an instrumental role in Jose Mourinho’s legendary treble-winning Inter Milan side, as well as reaching the World Cup final with the Netherlands.
Granted, he was on the losing side of that final, but to reach the zenith of international football in the same year you win a treble feels like enough to win the Ballon d’Or to us.
9 Zlatan Ibrahimovic
12 league titles, six top-10 Ballon d’Or finishes
From a man with one stand-out year that should have netted him the award to a man with one of the longest careers at the very top of the game in recent memory, Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
The Swedish monster had an unbelievable record in football, scoring 496 goals and providing 205 assists in 827 professional games, which means he averaged a goal involvement every 1.17 games across a 24-year career – and that’s just at club level.
He also won practically everything there was to win at the domestic level, finishing with five Serie A titles, four Ligue 1 titles, one La Liga title, two Eredivisie titles and a mountain of domestic cups to boot.
He only failed to win an international title and the Champions League. This likely hurt his cause, but considering he finished in the top ten of the Ballon d’Or six times, we genuinely believe he should have come out on top at least once.
It shows how much of a hold Messi and Ronaldo had on that era of football.
Ibrahimovic’s career in numbers:
Sweden
122
62
Paris Saint-Germain
180
156
AC Milan
163
93
Inter Milan
117
66
Ajax
110
48
Juventus
92
26
LA Galaxy
58
53
Manchester United
53
29
Barcelona
46
22
Malmö FF
8
3
Read more: 10 best goals not to win the Puskas Award
8 David Beckham
1999 Ballon d’Or runner-up
Ol’ Golden Balls himself managed to go his entire career without getting his hands on the most famous golden ball of them all, the Ballon d’Or.
Now, many of those who didn’t watch David Beckham in his prime might think of him as a deadball merchant and more of a celebrity than a footballer, but let’s be clear: Beckham was one of the most talented footballers of his generation.
He was such a talent that during a game against Real Madrid, Zinedine Zidane came over and asked the Manchester United man to leave the Red Devils and come play for Los Blancos instead – something he would eventually do.
Beckham finished in the top ten of the Ballon d’Or three times in his career, with a highest finish of fourth in 2001. Still, we reckon he deserved more across his brilliant career that saw him lift one Champions League, six Premier Leagues, one Ligue 1 title, plenty of domestic cups and even the UEFA Best Player in Europe award in 1999.
Becks’ 1998-99 treble-winning season in numbers:
Appearances
55
Goals
9
Assists
20
Trophies
4
Read more: 10 memorable David Beckham moments
7 Andres Iniesta
Scorer of World Cup-winning goal, 2010
Just like Zlatan, Andres Iniesta has also featured in the Ballon d’Or’s top ten six times in his career, but unlike the Swede, he was once just a single place away from winning it when he finished in second place in 2010.
Now, Iniesta will be remembered as one of the most magical midfielders football has ever seen and one of the greatest Spanish players in history. He has won everything you can at club level, league titles, European trophies and domestic cups, but his crowning achievement came in 2010 when he scored the winning goal in the World Cup final.
That one goal ended Spain’s wait for their first World Cup and cemented the legacy of Andres Iniesta for generations to come, so why didn’t he win the Ballon d’Or?
Well, one man, Lionel Messi.
The Argentine had scored 60 goals and provided 17 assists in just 64 appearances that calendar year and won the same domestic titles as the Spaniard, so the voters clearly favoured the goals over the World Cup.
We can see their reasoning, but we disagree with it.
6 Gareth Bale
5 Champions League titles with Real Madrid
Historically, British players have struggled when they have played abroad. That’s starting to change, but it was undoubtedly still the case when Gareth Bale made his record-breaking move to Real Madrid in 2013.
The Welshman had just spent the previous season terrifying English defences, and he started doing the same to Spanish ones the second he arrived in Madrid.
His move may have soured towards the end, but there is no denying that the first few years in Spain were a massive success for Bale. In all, he scored 106 goals and provided 67 assists for Los Blancos, but most importantly, he played an essential part in their European triumphs.
The two goals that stand out are the overhead kick that gave them the lead against Liverpool in the 2018 final and the goal against Atletico Madrid that gave them the lead in 2014.
Without Bale, there is a genuine chance that Madrid wouldn’t have won those finals, so for our money, he’s worthy of at least one Ballon d’Or.
Bale’s career in stats:
Wales
111
40
22
Real Madrid
258
106
67
Tottenham Hotspur
236
71
58
Southampton
45
5
12
LAFC
14
3
0
5 Wayne Rooney
Premier League and Champions League winner in 2008
The second Englishman on our list, but we don’t think it’s too controversial to suggest that Wayne Rooney deserved at least one Ballon d’Or during his outlandish career.
The Liverpool-born dynamo spent most of his career helping Manchester United dominate the Premier League and even won the Champions League in 2008. The United legend retired with 313 goals and 170 assists to his name and as the top scorer for both club and country.
He only finished in the top ten of the Ballon d’Or three times in his career, somehow never finishing higher than fifth. However, for anyone watching him regularly, it was clear that he should’ve been regularly making it into the top five.
4 Neymar
World’s most expensive footballer
Neymar Jr is one of the most polarising superstars in modern football.
Some see him as an over-dramatic waste of money who was never going to reach the standards people expected of him, whereas others see him as a tragic case of what could have been after his move to Paris Saint-Germain ultimately didn’t work out.
We tend to fall on the latter side of the argument.
When Neymar moved to PSG in 2017, the football world was stunned. Still, his desire to escape the shadow of Messi did at least make some sense.
After all, he may have been widely regarded as the third-best player in the world, but so long as he was playing with Messi, he would always be the second-best player on the pitch.
However, people shouldn’t rewrite history just because he failed to deliver a Champions League to the Paris club; on his day, Neymar was a genuinely world-class footballer.
Across his career, he has scored 296 goals and provided 193 assists in 503 games, leaving him just shy of a goal involvement every time he stepped onto the pitch. He has won it all as well, with a Champions League, five Ligue 1 titles, two La Liga titles and a swath of domestic cups all under his belt at just 31.
He has made it into the top ten for the Ballon d’Or six times in his career and has finished third twice.
Can you guess the two men in front of him on both occasions? Messi and Ronaldo.
For all of his recent failings, there was a period between 2015 and 2017 in which Neymar was comfortably the third-best player in the world and had he been playing in any other era, he would undoubtedly have at least one Ballon d’Or to his name by now.
Neymar’s transfers:
1st July 2013
Santos
Barcelona
£71.4m
3rd August 2017
Barcelona
Paris Saint-Germain
£200m
15th August 2023
Paris Saint-Germain
Al-Hilal
£86m
3 Luis Suárez
Record-breaking 31 Premier League goals in 2013/14
Luis Suarez is another player who dominated the 2010s thanks to his outstanding goal record, and yet he closed out the decade without a Ballon d’Or to his name.
Two seasons spring to mind when we think of the Uruguayan striker; the first was his unbelievable 2013/14 campaign with Liverpool, and the second was his equally brilliant 2015/16 season with Barcelona.
In that first campaign, he ended the Premier League season with a frankly ridiculous 31 goals and 17 assists in just 33 games, meaning he averaged a goal involvement every 61 minutes. Yet, he did not even make it onto the ten-man shortlist for 2014.
The other season in 2015/16, his second with Barcelona, saw him score 59 goals and provide 24 assists in 53 games across all competitions, giving him an even more impressive average of a goal involvement every 57 minutes.
He also helped Barcelona win La Liga that season and finished in fourth for Ballon d’Or, behind Antonine Griezmann, Messi and Ronaldo.
Suarez’s career in numbers:
Appearances
760
Goals
261
Assists
164
Trophies
20
Read more: The top 10 Liverpool players to wear the No 7 shirt
2 Thierry Henry
39 goals in 2003/04 as Arsenal won title unbeaten
Arguably the greatest player the Premier League has ever seen and undeniably one of the most incredible forwards in football history, it is amazing that Thierry Henry finished his career never once winging that golden ball.
The Frenchman was electric for the entirety of his Arsenal career and made a massive difference to Barcelona in the short time he spent there. He really could have won the award at several points in his career, but we’d argue that he should have won in 2004.
He had finished second to Pavel Nedved the year beforehand, and if we’re being honest, he probably should have finished ahead of the Czech, but his performance against Real Madrid in the Champions League probably swayed opinion somewhat.
In 2004, however, Henry had just helped Arsenal claim their third Premier League title in six years and had done so without losing a game. He also finished as the team’s top scorer with 39 goals and 15 assists in just 51 games.
The team weren’t great in the Champions League, which is likely what hurt his chance of winning, but on an individual level, he was outstanding in Europe. In just ten games in the competition, he scored five goals and provided seven assists, giving him a goal involvement every 74 minutes.
Finally, if European competition was the deciding factor, Andriy Shevchenko shouldn’t have come in first place as AC Milan crashed out of the tournament in the quarter-finals – the same round as Arsenal.
