Dembele: No. 1 player? No. 1 winner!

Reprinted from: Labor Noon News

No suspense, in the 2025 Golden Globe Awards, Dembele won this championship in a way that everyone hoped for. From the Golden Ball to the final victory, the Frenchman's victory was so natural, but back to the beginning of last season, who would have thought that he would have the last laugh? It's not just Dembele, as Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo (C Ronaldo) grow old, the Golden Globes selection in recent years has become elusive, accompanied by surprises, reversals and controversy.

Who will win the 2025 Golden Globe Award? At first people may discuss the dispute between Haaland and Mbappe, or whether Vinicius can make up for last year's regrets, while Dembele, who scored at most 14 goals in a single season and has never been selected as a shortlist for the Golden Ball Awards, is not within people's consideration. But as the 2024-2025 season deepens, especially when Paris Saint-Germain tops the Champions League, Dembele, who scored 35 goals for the team throughout the season, led the Golden Ball Awards with a dark horse.

Why is Dembele? In addition to dazzling team honors and personal data, in this traditional sense of football's "Little New Year", the Champions League championship has become the biggest plus point. Salah, who was fully fired in the Premier League, helped Liverpool stand out in the league, but the team's premature elimination in the Champions League almost declared the "Pharaoh" withdrawal from the Ballon d'Or, and it was Paris Saint-Germain who eliminated them. Although Barcelona is the "triple champion" of domestic competitions, it has not been able to reach the end of the Champions League. It is true that Yamal performed well throughout the season, but Rafinia is also eye-catching, which has caused a certain degree of vote "diversion"; compared with the eight "Paris Grand" teammates who have entered the Golden Ball shortlist, Dembele's core position is more obvious.

Demberle's crowning becomes another new "Golden Ball" after Rodri in 2024. Compared with Dembele, Rodri's winning process of the Golden Globes is quite dramatic, and it can even be regarded as the biggest reversal in the history of the Golden Globes.

Like Dembele, Vinicius, who won the double La Liga and Champions League championships for Real Madrid in 2024, always ranked first in the Golden Ball Award odds, and even he himself believes in the award. But just a few hours before the award ceremony, many media reported that Vinicius' dream of "golden ball" was failed, and Spanish midfielder Rodri was the final winner. Real Madrid, who learned the results in advance, finally chose the entire team to absent from the award ceremony. Although the team was named the Best Men's Team, then head coach Ancelotti also won the Best Men's Football Coach Award.

Rodri's "decisive kill" is indeed sudden, but the award to the Spanish national team and the midfield cornerstone of the Premier League Manchester City team did not arouse much criticism. In the case where midfielders are at a natural disadvantage in participating in the Golden Globe Awards, Rodri's election is even more commendable, and some people regard this as a change in the voting trend of the Golden Globe Awards. And a year before, the selection of the 2023 Golden Globe Awards also triggered people's discussion of the selection criteria.

According to the rules, the Golden Globes take the player's performance in the New Year's Eve single season as a consideration, rather than a natural year as a cycle, which means that the player's performance in the 2022 Qatar World Cup will be included in the reference category of the 2023 Golden Globes. In December 2022, Messi led Argentina to win the World Cup, which means that at the beginning of the selection cycle, Messi was a big step ahead of others in the competition for the Golden Globes, and in the end he also won his eighth Golden Globes as he wished. However, after the World Cup, Messi performed mediocrely at Paris Saint-Germain and joined the American League in June of the following year, staying away from mainstream football.

The weight of the World Cup, Messi's influence, and the sensational effect of the Argentina team after winning the championship, the results of the Golden Ball Awards are understandable. However, some people have expressed their grievances for Haaland, who ranked second. The Norwegian striker's highlight performance at Manchester City lasted throughout the 2022-2023 season. While helping "Blue Moon" win the "triple champions" of the Champions League, Premier League and FA Cup, he also won the best scorer in the league and the Champions League, and even broke the Premier League's "Golden Boot" goal record with 36 goals. Of course, some people refute that Norwegian team failed to enter the Qatar World Cup, which is a flaw that Haaland cannot erase.

It can be foreseeable that due to the vague areas of the Golden Globe selection rules and the subjective factors of the judges, such debates will continue. But in the opinion of reporters, in an era when the attractiveness of the Golden Globes has slightly declined, increasing topicality in a timely manner is also a way to maintain popularity. According to Xinhua News Agency