French football magazine Football Football has named the 2018 Golden Ball winner from a list of 30 names announced on October 9.
Among the nominated names, there is one Arab player, the Egyptian star Mohammed Salah, who entered the list based on his brilliance with Liverpool last season, collecting the titles of the best player in the Premier League and the goal of the competition, in a rare achievement.
But what are Salah's chances of winning the most prestigious individual award that football has ever seen in history, or even in the advanced position?
Unlike the hopes of football fans in Egypt and the Arab world, Salah's Golden Ball is a very weak prospect, not because of doubts about Salah's numbers and achievements last season with Liverpool, but for regulatory reasons about the nature of the award itself.
Fazla, who entered the short list of the FIFA World Player of the Year award and finished third behind Croatian Luka Modric and Cristiano Ronaldo, will find it difficult to repeat the same feat with Balloon Role.
The reason for this is that France Football's assessment of the best players depends on their performance during the year, rather than during a football season like the FIFA award.
In the second half of 2018, Salah took off his shirt, especially after a shock injury during the Champions League final against Real Madrid, which cost him weeks off.
After months of brilliance at the start of the year with Liverpool in the Premier League and the Champions League, Salah's train has been relatively disrupted for physical and technical reasons, while his level dropped significantly during the current season, after scoring two goals for Egypt in the 2018 World Cup in Russia, which was not fully ready.
Sky Italia said Modric was the highest-rated player in the award, and Real Madrid were preparing to crown a new record at the ceremony on Monday evening in Paris.
The site said Ronaldo would come in second, followed by French World Cup champion Antoine Grazman, with a controversial surprise is the absence of Argentine star Lionel Messi.
The Golden Ball award is decided by a direct vote of 173 journalists, chosen by the FFF magazine, and the list of voters is confidential.
