Personal Triple: Modric Wins Ballon d'Or

Luka Modric is the outstanding footballer of the calendar year 2018. The Croat also wins the election of the Ballon d'Or and distances among others Cristiano Ronaldo.

Luka Modric's personal treble is perfect: his first victory at the prestigious "Ballon d'Or" poll in the French magazine "France Football" earned the Croatian vice-champion of Champions League winner Real Madrid his "European footballer of the year "and" World Player of the Year "also the third and final big individual award in 2018.

The 33-year-old defeated European champion Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal / Juventus Turin) as well as French international champions Antoine Griezmann (Atletico Madrid) and Kylian Mbappé (Paris St. Germain) in the election by specialist journalists from all over the world. Argentina superstar Lionel Messi (FC Barcelona), like Ronaldo five-time world footballer, came in fifth. The Brazilian top star Neymar (Paris St. Germain) missed as twelfth even a top 10 placement. German players and pros from German clubs were not on the nomination list with a total of 30 names.


Success for German national team captain
At the premiere of the "Golden Ball" for women, German national team captain Dzsenifer Marozsan from French Champions League winner Olympique Lyon finished third with a strong result. Only their victorious club colleague Ada Hegerberg from Norway and Danish European footballer Pernille Harder from German double winner VfL Wolfsburg collected more votes.

In the U21 category, US youngster Christian Pulisic from Bundesliga leader Borussia Dortmund took second place in the expected success of Mbappé (110 points) following the election of a jury with earlier "Ballon d'Or" winners such as Franz Beckenbauer (31 ).

Tradition for over 60 years
Since 1956, the outstanding footballers of the year have been awarded the Ballon d'Or. Initially, only European players could be selected, from 1995 all footballers from European clubs and from 2007 every professional regardless of league and nationality. Between 2010 and 2015, the World Federation of Fifa awarded the Ballon d'Or on the basis of an agreement with "France Football", which replaced in this period the election of the World Player of the Year.

Since 2016, the prize has been awarded again by "France Football". Fifa has its own choice with "The Best".