Cristiano Ronaldo has endorsed a post which criticised the decision to award Lionel Messi the Ballon d’Or for the year 2021.
The PSG attacker won the seventh Ballon d’Or of his career this week, holding off competition from Bayern’s Robert Lewandowski, Real Madrid’s Karim Benzema and Chelsea’s Jorginho.
Messi was favourite to win the award after he helped guide Argentina to success in the Copa America this year, while at club level he won the Copa del Rey with Barcelona and finished as La Liga’s highest goalscorer.
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But, many felt that Barcelona’s poor performances in the Spanish league and the Champions League should have counted against Messi in the voting.
Ronaldo, meanwhile, was not named in the top three of the Ballon d’Or for the first time in 11 years. And a Ronaldo fan account was furious with the decision and even accused Messi of ‘stealing’ the award.
In his response to the lengthy rant, Manchester United forward Ronaldo liked the post and left a comment which simply read: ‘facts’.
The Instagram post read: ’43 goals in the year, 6 goals in 5 games in this Champions League, all decisive and a guy who, regardless of age, continues to work miracles and is the guy who most impresses the world most often.
‘They still put the guy in 6th… Do you really think that 5 guys did more than him in the year? Never.
‘For Cristiano to win this prize he has to be 300% unquestionable. It’s no use scoring the most beautiful bike of the year, being champion of everything by club, top scorer of everything and scoring a hat-trick in the World Cup, they still provide a way to take his prize.
‘With Messi, it’s the other way around. He can do a low-key season, way below, they’ll always find a way to favour him and give him the award.
‘Steal. Dirt. Shame. It’s just unfortunate. Who saw it, saw it. Those who are intelligent enough know who deserve the truth.’
