By Victor Kanayo
The 2022 World Cup winning captain and Argentina star Lionel Messi has been picked among three final list of players in the FIFA men’s best award.
The two others are French stars – Kylian Mbappe and Karim Benzema.
The final shortlist of footballers were made public by FIFA on Friday February 10, 2023.
Messi edged Mbappé for the Golden Ball awarded by FIFA as the best player at the World Cup. Croatia captain Luka Modrić placed third in that contest.
Messi won his six previous awards when it was called the FIFA World Player of the Year (2009), the FIFA Ballon d’Or each year from 2010-12 and again in 2015, then in the current title of Best FIFA Men’s Player for 2019.
Mbappe makes the shortlist for the first time though he was fourth in voting for the 2018 award. The 24-year-old has been sixth, seventh and eighth in past three years.
Robert Lewandowski won the FIFA award for the past two years.
The more prestigious Ballon d’Or award organised by France Football magazine was won in October by Karim Benzema ahead of the World Cup.
The France forward missed the tournament because of an injury. Messi was not on the long list of Ballon d’Or candidates announced in August.
Another duel is expected for the Paris Saint-Germain teammates with Messi favoured to get a seventh win in FIFA’s annual individual prize. Mbappé seeks his first.
In the Best Women’s Player award, Beth Mead of England, Alex Morgan of the United States and Spain’s Alexia Putellas were on the shortlist voted for by a separate global voting panel.
The winners will be announced on February 27 ceremony at an event in Paris, France capital.
