Does Franck Ribery Still Have a Shot at the Ballon D'Or?

What a difference a few hours can make.

When the Ballon d'Or shortlist was announced in October, most expected it to be a two-horse race between a Mr. Messi and one Mr. Ronaldo. However, something peculiar happened: According to the bookmakers, Franck Ribery was the favourite. 

When you consider the facts, it is not so surprising that such a threat had been posed to the Ronaldo/Messi hegemony.

Bayern Munich have won an historic treble, and of the six players from the Bundesliga champions to receive Ballon d'Or nominations, Ribery is arguably the most important. He is selfless, his work rate is incredible and he will very seldom play a bad game.

Frankly (pun intended), the incumbent UEFA Best Player in Europe will never get a better chance at winning the most coveted individual prize in football—a fact that he conceded over the summer, as per Yahoo.  

With such momentum behind his World Player of the Year campaign, the highly acclaimed Frenchman even cleared a space at home for the vaunted golden sphere. "It will go above my fireplace in the main living room," he told French reporters via The Metro. 

Shortly after the nominations were released, four-time World Player of the Year Lionel Messi picked up a recurring thigh injury that is set to keep him out of play until the new year.

Then, Cristiano Ronaldo had a very public falling out with FIFA president Sepp Blatter, fuelling suggestions that the Portuguese star might boycott the ceremony, and therefore lose credence with football's governing body.

The road towards Ballon d'Or glory could not have been clearer for Monsieur Ribery!

But, to paraphrase the Fresh Prince, his award campaign got flipped, turned upside-down within a matter of hours. 

It probably hasn't escaped your attention that Cristiano Ronaldo put in a tremendous performance against Sweden on Tuesday, scoring a hat-trick that guaranteed Portugal a berth at next summer's World Cup. 

On the very same day, by coincidence, FIFA announced that the deadline for Ballon d'Or voting had been extended to November 29th, due to that fact that a great deal of the 509-member panel of coaches, national teams captains and journalists had yet to register their votes.

Not only were prospective voters given the chance to consider Ronaldo's one-man show in their decision, but according to sources such as The Independent, those who have already voted are—for no particular reason—being given the chance to reconsider.

Subsequently, according to betting aggregator sites like oddschecker.com, Ronaldo is now odds-on favourite to scoop his second World Player of the Year gong, with odds of either 4/11 or 2/5. Ribery, meanwhile, is in second place with the reverse odds of either 5/2 or 11/4, while Messi is cast adrift at around 8/1.

As I said at the beginning of this piece, what a difference a few hours can make.   

The new pecking order may also have been affected by Ribery's unfortunate injury status. While helping France steal an unlikely World Cup victory in Kiev, the 30-year-old broke a rib. The official Bayern site has ruled him out of the weekend's crunch tie at the Westfalenstadion, and also made him a doubt for the trip to Moscow to face CSKA in the week. 

At a time when Ribery needs to remind voters of exactly what he can offer, the timing of the injury simply couldn't be worse.

Of course, voters should be considering the entire year that each player has experienced, but recent performances will surely have more of an impact on those who don't have time to trawl through twelve months of statistics.

In some respects, one could argue that Ronaldo is an unquestionable choice for the award. After missing out for so many consecutive years, the Real Madrid star has scored 66 goals for club and country this year, which is 21 more than anyone else. This season alone he has put away five hat-tricks.

If Ronaldo was to get the silver medal again this year, he would be the subject of a perennial inequity that would drive most people to despair.

But while Ribery hasn't scored as many goals, one could argue that his contributions have been more successful, playing a pivotal part in a devastatingly dominant team. 

However, in the same way that Wesley Sneijder didn't break the top three in 2010 despite winning the treble and making the World Cup Final, it looks as if Ribery's brilliance has been overshadowed by a stunning individual effort. 

This is Ribery's best ever chance for Ballon d'Or recognition and he still has a shot, but all signs suggest the momentum is now behind the man from Madeira. 

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