11.01.2011 12:00

World impact of Messi’s Ballon d’Or

www.fcbarcelona.cat

Leo Messi winning the Ballon d’Or has made most of the headlines in Spain, but the story was also reported elsewhere in the world, especially in his home continent of South America.

If there is any one person that is dominating the news right now, then his name is Leo Messi. The FIFA Ballon d’Or 2010 is in the headlines in Catalonia, Spain and the rest of the world.

Local news

The Catalan sports dailies, ‘Sport’, ‘El Mundo Deportivo’ and ‘El 9 Esportiu’ have all mentioned not just Leo Messi but also the way the top three were all Barça players. ‘Sport’ speaks of ‘Gold for Messi. Glory for Barça’, while ‘Mundo Deportivo’ leads with ‘Messi! Leo wins second Ballon d’Or aged 23 anys’ and ‘El 9 Esportiu’ proclaims that ‘Messi brings it back’.

Surprise choice

Other papers expressed their shock that neither Iniesta nor Xavi collected the award after all they did at the World Cup in South Africa. ‘Marca’ bemoans ‘Two giants and one anti-Spanish’ with pictures of Messi and Mourinho. The paper was annoyed that FIFA and Sepp Blatter failed to recognise any of Xavi, Iniesta or Del Bosque. ‘As’ was of a similar mind, and felt ‘Spain is seething’ that Messi was picked ahead of Iniesta and Xavi.

General papers

Despite the important announcement of the ETA ceasefire, Leo Messi and his prize also got plenty of coverage in the national broadsheets. ‘El Periódico de Catalunya’, ‘La Vanguardia’ and ‘Ara’ all included front page stories and extensive coverage of the events in Zurich.

‘El País’, ‘El Mundo’, ‘Público’ and ‘ABC’ also reported on Messi’s award, and the general suggestion was that the Argentine star is up there with Di Stefano, Pelé, Cruyff and Maradona.

King of Argentina

And naturally there was joy in Messi’s home country. In Argentina, ‘Olé’ filled the front page with the news, under the headline ‘The secret of his golds’. ‘Clarín’ and ‘La Nación’ also had plenty to say about the award.

But other Latin American countries also hailed yet another success for the Bará striker, including Brazilian daily O’Globo.

Europe too

Back in Europe, the FIFA party was also a major story. French paper ‘L’Équipe’, for instance, titled its report with the play on words ‘Messi? Mais sí’.

But Italian sports paper ‘Gazzetta dello Sport’ was less impressed with the decision, and felt it was a “Ballon d’Or for a disappointing year”, while ‘Corriere dello Sport’ also considered it surprising that Messi was chosen.