After 17 years of "like-mindedness", the Golden Globes and the World Footballer of the Year finally have different winners. So, why did Messi and Levan win the Ballon d'Or and The World Footballer of the Year respectively?
Different selection systems
First of all, this should start with the different selection systems of the two major awards.
To compete with the Ballon d'Or, FIFA introduced the World Footballer of the Year award in 1991, which was judged by national team managers, captains and the media.
However, Mr. World Footballer's influence has never been as great as the Ballon d'Or, and in 2010 FIFA made an important decision to launch the FIFA Ballon d'Or in partnership with French Football. After the agreement expired, the two families parted ways in 2016.
After that, the two awards adopted different selection systems, which may be one of the important reasons why Messi and Levan won awards respectively.
The Golden Globes continue the tradition of having the media judges do as judges, but expand the media from Europe to the world. The World Footballer of the Year is ingenious, with the national team manager, captain, media and fans each accounting for 25% of the votes.
In the Voting Man of the Year of the World, Levan was ranked first in the manager, captain, media votes, while in the fan vote, Messi was ranked first, and Levan was even squeezed to third place.
47 days to complete the overtaking
Surprisingly, in the Golden Globe Awards voted entirely by the media, Messi overtook Levan (580 points) with 613 points. However, in the media vote of World Footballer of the Year, Messi is significantly lower than Levan.
The media voted differently, and the key reason may be the different voting times.
The Ballon d'Or voted from Oct. 8 to 24, while the World Footballer of the Year voted from Nov. 22 to Dec. 10, with a nearly 50-day difference in voting deadlines for the two awards.
Messi has underperformed during those 47 days, with the Argentine making eight appearances in 11 games and scoring just three goals. In Ligue 1, Messi scored only 1 goal in 6 appearances, and as a result, he encountered more and more doubts.
Levan has clearly outperformed, scoring six goals in five Bundesliga games and having only kept a clean sheet by Bielefeld. In the Champions League, Levan scored four goals in three games, adding up to seven more goals than Messi.
Although France Football and FIFA have emphasized that the start and end dates of this selection are from October 8, 2020 to August 7, 2021, when voting, whether it is the managers, captains and journalists of the returning teams of various countries, they will be affected by the performance of the players this season.
This was reflected in the reporter's vote for both awards, and in the media vote of the World Footballer of the Year, Levine scored 589 points, 180 points more than Messi (409 points). Compared with the Ballon d'Or vote, Levan completed the reversal with his performance in these 47 days.
The impact of the voting deadline on the outcome was also reflected in Salah's selection. In the Ballon d'Or, Salah ranked only 7th. In the 2020-21 season, Salah's Liverpool won nothing, and the Egyptian winger's performance of 26 goals and 6 assists was far inferior to Messi and Levan.
However, Salah has performed quite bravely this season, with 32 goals in 26 games in all competitions and 25 goals in 20 Premier League games, making him the top scorer.
In the Voting Man of the Year, Salah even surpassed Messi in the manager vote, while in the fan vote, Salah also ranked second, squeezing Levan to third place, enough to prove that they did not only consider Salah's performance last season.
Humanity vote, sympathy vote
Before merging with the Ballon d'Or, one of the most criticized aspects of the World Footballer of the Year was his lack of authority. Compared with the media reporters who pay more attention to the five major leagues, the familiarity of the coaches and captains of various countries is obviously more inferior.
Not only that, coaches and captains of various countries often cast "human votes". For example, Messi voted three times for Neymar, Mbappe and Benzema, the first two of whom were his Paris teammates, and Neymar was his best friend for many years.
As the captain of the French team, Lowry voted three times to Benzema, Mbappe and Kante respectively, which can be described as a good choice, and French coach Deschamps also chose the same three players, even in exactly the same order.
Interestingly, only Messi, Brazilian captain Thiago Silva and the Lao boss voted first for Neymar. However, from the performance point of view, Neymar obviously cannot be compared with Levan, Messi and even Benzema and Mbappe.
Compared to Neymar, Levan may have received some "sympathy votes". This starts from 2020, "French Football" canceled the selection of the Ballon d'Or, which made Levine, who was originally holding it, miss the Ballon d'Or.
However, Levan got the 2020 World Footballer of the Year. At one point, the media analyzed that Messi had a higher chance of winning the World Footballer of the Year compared to the Ballon d'Or, because Levan would not get a "sympathy ticket".
However, it turns out that the coaches and captains of various countries have still been affected. Judging from the performance of clubs and national teams in the 2020-21 season, Levan has neither won the Champions League nor won the European Cup, and from this hard standard, Levan is obviously inferior to Messi.
Why can't the influence of the World Footballer of the Year surpass the Ballon d'Or? These three aspects may be the best footnotes.