A total of 12 players were initially nominated for the Best FIFA Men’s Player award, after being selected by a panel of experts.

Finally, to reach the top 3, Messi, Mbappe and Haaland had to surpass 9 other candidates including: Julian Alvarez, Marcelo Brozovic, Kevin De Bruyne, Ilkay Gundogan, Rodri, Bernardo Silva, Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, Victor Osimhen and Declan Rice.

According to voting criteria, the prize usually only counts achievements from December 19, 2022 to August 20, 2023. Thereby, the World Cup final ending on December 18, 2022 will not be counted.

However, on the FIFA homepage, Messi is still mentioned with his achievements at the 2022 World Cup with Argentina. After this championship, Messi and Neymar, Mbappe also won the Ligue 1 championship with PSG before the Argentine superstar moved to Inter Miami.

Messi scored 11 goals and assisted five times in the past 14 matches for Miami in the US, accounting for about 42% of his achievements during this period. Besides Messi, Mbappe is also mentioned as the runner-up when he lost to Messi’s Argentina at the 2022 World Cup. After the 2022 World Cup, Mbappe is only behind the all-time World Cup scoring record of the former German striker. Miroslav Klose 4 goals.

The former German international scored 16 goals in 24 matches in 4 tournaments. The French captain currently has 12 goals/14 matches in 2018 and 2022, but he is only 24 years old and will still participate in many upcoming World Cups.

However, Mbappe was considered unworthy of being in the top 3. In the performance phase, the France captain scored 17 goals/20 matches in Ligue 1, but he faded when PSG was eliminated from the 1/8 Champions round. League.