This player is not professional

Chapter 279
While Lin Yi was still playing around with his family, a major event aroused widespread discussion among the Chinese media and fans - UEFA announced the shortlist of three finalists for the best European players, and as a Chinese football Among the representatives, Lin Yi was among them. He, Messi and Ronaldo entered the final on-site voting and selection process. ．
For Chinese football, it is of course a big event for Lin Yi to be among them.Because no Chinese player has ever been able to reach this height before, let alone Chinese players, there is no one among Asian players, Lin Yi is the first.

At first everyone thought it was the Ballon d'Or, but later it turned out that he was the best player in Europe.

This award is a little unfamiliar to Chinese fans. In everyone's traditional impression, the two most famous annual awards in international football are also the pinnacle of personal honors for players. They should be FIFA's "World Footballer" and "France". "European Ballon d'Or" held by "Football".

Who is the best player in Europe?
It sounds like it doesn't have a lot of gold content but a lot of moisture.Could it be that the Chinese media habitually put gold in the faces of its players and forcefully brag?
Then the Chinese media quickly started popularizing the science and told everyone that this award is actually very awesome - strictly speaking, the predecessor of the European Player of the Year should be the "UEFA Season Club Best Player" awarded every year before the Champions League draw ceremony. players".

Chinese fans must have an impression of this. Every year before the draw ceremony of the new Champions League group groups, the best players of the previous season will be awarded, including the best player, best forward, best midfielder, best defender and best goalkeeper. .However, many people think that it is the best in the Champions League, but it is not. It is the overall selection of all European club players, including the player's performance in club leagues, domestic cups, Europa League, Champions League, and even national team games. comprehensive assessment.

In fact, this will have nothing to do with the Champions League, but because the reference value of the Champions League is too large, especially in non-competition years, performance in the Champions League can almost determine the results of these best awards.Over time, it gives people the impression that these best are the best in the Champions League.

One thing can prove that this is not the case - this award was established in the 1997-1998 season, and the first European Club Player of the Year winner was Brazilian forward Ronaldo who played for Inter Milan that season.He did not participate in the Champions League that season. He participated in the UEFA Cup, helping Inter Milan defeat Lazio in the final and win the UEFA Cup. The pendulum goal in the final became an eternal classic.

Since Ronaldo, only players who have participated in the Champions League, and even players who have won the Champions League, have won this award. The only exception is Buffon, the best player in the 2-2 season. He represents Juventus. In the Champions League final, they lost to AC Milan on penalty kicks, but Buffon won the best player award with his stable and outstanding performance.Won the best player as a goalkeeper, Buffon is worthy of being the top goalkeeper in Europe.

After getting rid of the misunderstanding about this award, it will be easy to understand that this award is actually very important - in fact, it is not impossible to say that it is the official version of UEFA's "European Footballer"...

Due to historical reasons, "France Football" has a long-standing Ballon d'Or award. The World Footballer selection led by FIFA also started as early as 1991. Compared with them, the first European Best Player was held in 1998. Player selection is too young and lacks authority.Especially since this award has to be split into various positions, its importance and topicality are not as important as the "only" World Footballer and Ballon d'Or.

However, after 2o1o, this situation changed.

In 2, FIFA and "France Football" cooperated to merge the World Footballer and Ballon d'Or Awards to form the FIFA Ballon d'Or Awards.UEFA feels that it is really uncomfortable not to have its own voice in this annual selection, not to mention that the first cooperation between FIFA and "France Football" caused trouble. That year, they won the club's honorary treble. Sneijder, who led the Dutch national team to the World Cup finals in South Africa, actually lost to Messi in the FIFA Ballon d'Or selection and did not even make the shortlist of three final candidates. This means that he was not even included in the voting process. None of the top three.Messi's teammates at the club, midfielder Xavi and his partner Iniesta, who helped the Spanish national team win the historic World Cup, also lost to Messi.Messi's winning of the award caused an uproar in the media, with everyone questioning the authority and professionalism of the FIFA Ballon d'Or.

Even Messi himself was very embarrassed about him receiving this award, and the Catalan media felt that not giving it to Xavi was really unjustifiable.

The Dutch media were angry that Sneijder was not even in the top three.

After such a farce, UEFA led by Platini believes that they should respond to the voice of the masses and come out to maintain the fairness and authority of football selections.

But "France Football" has already cooperated with FIFA. The cooperative relationship will not expire until 2o16, and the two parties can also renew the contract.It is said that Blatter paid 500 million euros to amary media group in order to obtain authorization from amary media group, which is affiliated with France Football, the organizer of the Ballon d'Or.

Since they do not have the right to use the "Ballon d'Or", UEFA thought of the UEFA Club Player of the Season award that they have held for 12 years.

So in 2o11, the original UEFA Club Player of the Season selection was gone, replaced by the "Best Player in Europe" selection. The original practice of sharing the best among each position was also cancelled. There was no best player. Forward, best goalkeeper, best midfielder, best defender, there is only one best player left, representing the best player among the players playing for European clubs that season.

The difference between this award and FIFA's Ballon d'Or is that it does not use natural years as the time period to judge player performance, but seasons as the time unit.Before the start of each season, one of the best players in all of Europe from the previous season is selected.

In order to ensure the authority of this award, UEFA has enlisted the help of the European Sports Media Alliance, which has also greatly increased the value of the new European Player of the Year award.Do you want to know why the European Ballon d'Or Award of "France Football" back then has always been considered to be a more professional and powerful award than FIFA's Footballer of the Year selection?It is because of the difference in the selection methods between the two. Unlike FIFA's method of voting by the head coaches and captains of all FIFA member countries, the Ballon d'Or award uses the votes of journalists from authoritative European sports media, which is more convincing.

Now UEFA has done the same thing as "France Football". When the FIFA Ballon d'Or Award was controversial, the emergence of this European Best Player Award naturally quickly attracted the attention of the general public and professionals. welcome and recognition.

Some people even mistake this award as the successor of the European Golden Globe Award, which shows the professionalism of this award.

Players also view this award as an important honor.

For example, in 2o12, Iniesta was elected as the European Player of the Season. Real Madrid star and Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo did not win the award. He directly showed his disappointment and was criticized for being ungraceful. .If he didn't care about the award, would he have made it so obvious?
The famous "Ronaldo three votes" allusion also occurred in the first European Player of the Season. After Messi was elected as the best player, Cristiano Ronaldo was ridiculed as "Ronaldo" because he only received three votes. Three votes”.

Now the best player in Europe is no longer a piece of cake, but a resounding honor.

Lin Yi, as the representative of Chinese players, can be selected into the final three-man list, and his historical status will suddenly be different.In the past, everyone thought that his personal abilities were outstanding, but he lacked recognition from influential awards. Even if his supporters said that he was the world's top star, they would still face the risk of being criticized. That is no longer the case.

This is recognition from the most authoritative European Sports Media Alliance. Who dares to say that Lin Yi is not the world's top player?

Chinese fans and media are naturally happy for Lin Yi's selection, but at the same time they are also a little worried...

This is really strange. They have all been selected into the final three list. What else is there to worry about?

What they were worried about was that Lin Yi might be selected this time to accompany the prince to study, just for a formality. In fact, he was not the one who won the award in the end!

Although Lin Yi can become the final three candidates and has created the history of Chinese football and even Asian football, everyone still hopes that he can win the highest honor. ．
Many people even have this idea in their minds - Lin Yihui was amazing last season. Honorably, he led the team to win the Premier League championship and even won the Big Ear Cup in the Champions League.

Such an amazing achievement and blinding results, and there is no big competition year, no European Cup and World Cup champions to influence the selection. If he can't win this time, then who knows when he will have to wait until the next time. ?

In fact, to put it bluntly, the majority of Chinese fans are still not confident enough in Lin Yi. Although Lin Yi is still very young, everyone always thinks that being able to enter the final list this time is just like shit. But such good luck has disappeared. I have to look after Lin Yi every time.

Now that it has appeared, you should seize it, otherwise there will be no such store after passing this village.

But the reality is cruel. It does not mean that if you get enough honors, you will definitely win the award.

Many people have such worries, and the reason why they have such worries is because there have been similar precedents before.

The 2 FIFA Ballon d'Or selection was the first year that FIFA and the "France Football" magazine Ballon d'Or were merged. That year was also the year of the World Cup.

The final three candidates for the FIFA Ballon d'Or that year were Iniesta, Xavi and Messi.

There is no need to look at the final results, just look at the three-person candidate list. Anyone who really understands football can see the problem, because only the top three in the voting process can enter the final candidate list. The Dutch midfielder , Inter Milan’s core Sneijder is not here!

In the European club competition that year, Inter Milan became the biggest winner. The team led by Mourinho won the Serie A championship, Italian Cup championship and Champions League championship, becoming the first triple crown in Serie A history.The core of the team, Sneijder, is the key figure in the team's ability to win the Triple Crown. His performance is very good.In the various awards for the best club players in the European season in the middle of the year, Sneijder beat Barcelona's Xavi and Bayern Munich's Dutch compatriot Robben to become the best midfielder.

In the national team competition that year, Sneijder's good form also continued. He and Robben led the Dutch national team through the World Cup in South Africa, and reached the World Cup final again after the 1978 World Cup in Germany. This is the best result of the Dutch national team in the World Cup after 32 years.Especially when playing against the favorite Brazilian team, Sneijder's performance was even more perfect. When the Brazilian team took the lead in the first half and the situation was great, it was Sneijder who stood up and scored two goals. The ball completed the comeback against Brazil, sending Kaka back to Brazil, and he made it all the way to the final.

In the final, the Netherlands and Spain struggled until overtime before they were finally defeated by Iniesta's goal.But despite this, Sneijder's performance in that World Cup was perfect.With five goals and one assist, Sneijder used such statistics to tell everyone that he is the core and leader of the Dutch national team.He also won the Silver Ball and Bronze Boot awards at that World Cup.

The club's honor and the performance of the national team are both very good. Compared with Lin Yi, this performance is probably not far behind, because with the bonus of the national team competition, it may be more convincing than Lin Yi's results.

But such an outstanding player, at the peak of his career, couldn't even make it into the top three in the selection that year...

The FIFA Ballon d'Or is the merger of the former World Player of the Year and the Ballon d'Or of "France Football", so the voting method is a simple and crude addition of the two voting methods, but the weight is not considered. The reporter voting method of "France Football" Ballon d'Or Award and the voting method of national team head coach + captain of FIFA World Player are simply added together, but the number of national team head coaches and captains is significantly more than that of media reporters. Ah, so the number of votes cast by the national team head coach and captain will be much greater than that of reporters, and their choice will determine the final result. The reporters' vote, which is known for its authority, has become a foil and a make-up.

In the voting session, it can be seen that Sneijder had the highest reporter voting rate. He received [-]% of the reporters’ votes. However, Sneijder’s voting rate for the national team captain and head coach was not as good as the final. The top three competitors were [-]% and [-]% respectively.

In the final total vote rate, Sneijder ranked fourth with 14.00% and 20.00%.And what about Messi, who ranks first in this category?The total vote rate was as high as [-]%[-]%, but the media vote rate was indeed the lowest among the top four - [-]%.

He relied on the votes of the national team captain and national team coach, which were [-]% and [-]% respectively, significantly ahead of the remaining three.

(End of this chapter)