The 2024 Ballon d’Or ceremony, which hands out some of the most prestigious awards in soccer, took place on October 28. The men’s and women’s individual awards were given to Manchester City midfielder Rodri and Barcelona’s Aitana Bonmati, respectively. Both Rodri and Bonmati are Spanish national team players. The awards name the best player throughout the entire season for club and country and are voted on by the top soccer journalists in the world.
Rodri, 28, pulled in front of Real Madrid’s Vinicius Junior to win the top men’s award, with Jude Bellingham completing the top three. Rodri is the only “defensive” midfielder ever to have won this award. It is a challenging task to rank the players every year, a task which is undertaken by journalists from the top 100 UEFA-ranked countries. Last year, Messi won the trophy for the 8th time in his career.
Recently, Rodri has been in top form. He played a pivotal role in helping Spain secure the European Championship title earlier this summer and won last season’s Premier League with Manchester City. Unfortunately, he has since sustained an ACL injury, adding himself to a long list of injured players in the world’s top leagues.
Spanish youngster Lamine Yamal secured the Kopa Trophy which names the best under-21 player throughout all five major worldwide soccer leagues. The award is named after 1958 Ballon d’Or winner Raymond Kopa and is decided by previous Ballon d’Or winners. Barcelona has shown dominance in the award, which only began six years ago, with three out of the six coming from players of their own world-renowned academy La Masia.
Yamal, at the young age of 17, has already made significant accomplishments such as this summer’s Euros trophy with Spain. During that tournament, he became a key part of the Spanish team, recording four assists and one goal. He became the youngest player ever to win a European Championship or World Cup, happening just one day after his 17th birthday. He also won La Liga with Barcelona during the 2023/24 season and the 2023/24 Supercopa de España. Yamal has risen through the academy’s ranks, getting his senior team debut under the previous Barcelona manager Xavi. Various world-renowned talents have recently come out of Barcelona’s academy including Pau Cubarsí, Marc Casado, Fermin Lopez and more. Some of the most famous products of the academy include Messi, Jordi Alba, Sergio Busquets and Andres Iniesta.
The Women’s Team of the Year was awarded to the Barcelona women’s team. This was no surprise to anyone in the soccer world, with Barcelona having won the same award in the past two years. Barcelona’s winning streak continues to show their complete and utter dominance in the world of women’s soccer. They won the Women’s Champions League earlier this year and they are the only women’s Spanish club to have completed the continental treble and continental quadruple. Barcelona also has the Ballon d’Or winners from the past two years on their team—Bonmati, and Alexia Putellas from 2023.
