THE BIGGEST NAMES in world football gathered at Kongresshaus in Zurich for the 2014 Ballon d’Or awards ceremony today.
We brought you all the winners and, as always, we’d love to hear your thoughts. Email ben@thescore.ie, tweet @football_.ie, post a message to our Facebook wall, or leave a comment below.
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- Stephanie Roche comes second in the Puskas Award behind winner James Rodriguez. Robin van Persie is third.
- Cristiano Ronaldo wins his second consecutive Ballon d’or with Lionel Messi finishing runner-up ahead of Manuel Neuer.
Good afternoon, folks. While many of you will be finishing up an average mid-January Monday in work, Ireland strike Stephanie Roche is right now rubbing shoulders with the world’s best players.
Having remarkably made the final three of this year’s Puskas Award for her spectacular finish for Pemaount United back in October 2013 (you’ve definitely seen it by now), the 26-year-old is attending the glamorous event in Zurich.
Roche is up against Manchester United and Dutch striker Robin van Persie and James Rodriguez, of Real Madrid and Colombia, and a winner will be announced in the coming hours.
She has already met one of the other finalists today, as well as legendary Italian Alessandro Del Piero. Incidentally, Van Persie won’t be in attendance as he injured himself during yesterday’s defeat to Southampton.
If the Dutchman does win, his compatriot Ruud Gullit will pick up the award on his behalf.
There is also the small matter of the Fifa Ballon d’Or prize, which Ronaldo will be aiming to win for the second consecutive year. He is up against old rival Lionel Messi, a former winner, and Bayern Munich goalkeeper Manuel Neuer.
Here’s the trio earlier today:
Steph and her boyfriend Dean Zambra have arrived in the past few minutes:
You can watch the event live on Fifa’s YouTube channel, on the RTE Player from 5.30pm or on Sky Sports.
Another year, another dodgy suit from Lionel Messi.
Right, tell us once and for all… which of the three goals is the best?
Poll Results:
You can still vote for your favourite here but only for the next few minutes. So it’s your very, VERY last chance.
While Roche has travelled with her father, brother, boyfriend, PR manager/boyfriend’s sister and a small number of the Irish media, the rest of the family will be watching down the local — Brady’s of Shankill.
Here we go then. Your host for tonight is Sky Sports presenter Katie Abdo.
Abdo explains that there is just under an hour to vote for your favourite goal, before showing all ten that made the long list. The winner is due to be announced at 6.30pm.
Del Piero is out on stage to help announce the FIFPro Team of the Year. No surprises to hear it’s Manuel Neuer in goal, with Sergio Ramos, Philipp Lahm, David Luiz and Thiago Silva making up the back four. Yes, David Luiz.
The midfield trio is Angel Di Maria, Andres Iniesta and Toni Kroos, while Arjen Robben, Leo Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo make up a frightening attack.
Jamie Carragher isn’t alone in expressing his surprise at one particular inclusion:
Next, Fifa president Sepp Blatter names 90-year-old Hiroshi Kagawa, a former Japanese international turned journalist, as the winner of this year’s Presidential Award.
In French, Blatter remembers the tragic events of the past week by adding: “Tonight, we are all Charlie”.
Vfl Wolfsburg’s Ralf Kellermann wins Women’s Coach of the Year. He uses his acceptance speech to pay tribute to Junior Malanda, the 20-year-old Wolfsburg player who died in a car crash this week.
And Germany’s Joachim Löw claims Men’s Coach of the Year after their World Cup victory in Brazil last summer.
The voting has officially CLOSED for the Puskas Award. We’re about five minutes away from finding out the winner. C’mon Steph!
Just when we think we are getting the Puskas Award winner announced…. the host introduces ‘a singer-songwriter from Switzerland’.
My lord, talk about filler!
The singer is finished now and we are seeing a montage previewing next year’s women’s World Cup.
Former Real Madrid star Christian Karembeu is on now to discuss the fight against Ebola.
That’s tough on Stephanie Roche but even to make the final three is an amazing achievement.
And just like that, the ceremony moves on. Manuel Neuer is now being interviewed on stage. Can we not have a few minutes to grieve??
Apparently Steph Roche was 9% short of winning.
Apparently 1.1 million people voted for Steph Roche, which shows how much support there was for the goal.
Any word on his jaw injury? It must not be as bad as cosy thought if he’s giving interviews and no mention of it at all.
Here’s hoping anyway.
Surely it would have been mentioned if it was bad and I’m going to take the fact that he can talk as a good sign. He was walking around at the end hugging people without flinching as well and let’s face it, his jaw-line is majestic anyway so I’d say it’ll be hard to do much damage.
He’s definitely ahead of White for us in my view but if both were missing it would be a huge blow.
He seems okay in Connacht players post match interviews with Connacht Rugby TV.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Q9YAmSizNY
It’s obvious now why Henshaw is leaving. He can’t get a spot as centre!
Peter Robb is a big unit. Is he good enough to compete against our international 12′s I wonder. Extra choice for Ireland at centre can only be a good thing.
After all the worrying about who our centres were going to be after BOD and D’Arcy retired, we will have a ridiculous amount of options going forward. Henshaw and Payne are clearly Joe’s first choice but then there’s the likes of McCloskey, Marshall, Olding, Ringrose and Aki maybe soon to be in the mix.
And that’s before mentioning other young lads like Scannel and Robb. Fitzgerald could be included but any games he gets for Ireland from now on will probably either be on the wing or from the bench and unfortunately for Cave his time with Ireland is probably up.
Arnold Luke Marshall Ronaldson Mcsharry and Farnell at Grenoble
Furlong bealham and Moore will be worthy of Ross’ throne once he’s gone. I think he could last 2-3 more years despite his age. He hasn’t had a huge number of caps because he wasn’t getting picked for years with Hayes court and Buckley all preferred.
Really happy to see Bealham doing so well. He should be pushing for an Ireland spot soon.
Developing into a super player, looks like the heir apparent to Mike Ross.