Cristiano Ronaldo has thanked the fans on social media after his 2008 Ballon d’Or was voted the greatest in the history of the award, with France Football’s B.O.A.T. poll landing on his first triumph at Manchester United.
The result, announced on Wednesday (October 28), put Cristiano Ronaldo’s 2008 win ahead of Lionel Messi‘s 2012 season and his own 2017 campaign. The 41-year-old Al-Nassr forward thanked the supporters who took part in the voting process.
Thanks for the submission!
In a post on X, he wrote:
“Football belongs to the fans! Thank you to all the fans around the world, the Ballon D’Or of All Time is also yours.”
The B.O.A.T. (Ballon d’Or of All Time) marked the award’s 70th anniversary and asked supporters to choose between the winning years of 10 players who had claimed at least two Ballon d’Ors. Voting ran from October 1 to October 27 at €1 per entry, with repeat votes allowed. Organizers said 5,009 people voted more than once, 44 of them between 10 and 26 times.
Messi’s 2012, the year of his 91 goals for Barcelona and Argentina, took second, and the pair filled the top 12 places between them, with Ronaldo Nazário’s 2002 the first entry from outside them in 13th. Messi still holds the record with eight Ballon d’Ors to Ronaldo’s five, and this vote does not change that.
Organizers were careful about the framing when naming the winner. They said:
“Please note that this is a public vote celebrating fan passion, not an official trophy,” they wrote on the Ballon d’Or website, adding that it is not the Super Ballon d’Or and comes with no physical prize.
Portugal’s federation was quicker to celebrate. “From 2008 to eternity. The Ballon d’Or of all time is Portuguese. Congratulations, captain!” its official X account posted, to praise Cristiano Ronaldo. Manchester United and Real Madrid also acknowledged the result on their social media handles.
A look into the 2008 season that won Cristiano Ronaldo the vote
The version of Cristiano Ronaldo that fans picked was the one that turned a young winger into a 40-goal forward. In 2007/08 he scored 42 goals in 49 appearances for Sir Alex Ferguson’s United, 31 of them in the Premier League to win the Golden Boot.
That haul carried the Old Trafford club to a Premier League and Champions League double. He headed the Red Devils in front in the Moscow final against Chelsea, then missed his penalty in the shootout, and Edwin van der Sar’s save from Nicolas Anelka settled the trophy.
He finished as the Champions League’s top scorer with eight goals and swept the individual prizes, from PFA Players’ Player of the Year to FIFA World Player of the Year. Aged 23, he became the fourth United player to win the Ballon d’Or after George Best, Sir Bobby Charlton and Denis Law, and the first of his five.
Edited by Vignesh Raja
