Fifa President, Gianni Infantino has taken notice of Messi and Ronaldo’s absence from this years The Best awards. Infantino has not taken the issue lightly and has instructed the Fifa’s legal panel to make sure that the two super stars of world football are present at the awards ceremony in honour of the year’s best 11 players.
This year’s FIFA Men’s Best Award was won by Luka Modric. Cristiano Ronaldo and Mohamed Salah were among the top three nominees of the award. Salah did attend the awards ceremony. He also won the Puskas award this year. However, Cristiano Ronaldo decided to snub the awards. And his old rival Lionel Messi, who was not in the final nominations of the award, also decided to remain absent.
It is certain that with the absence of two of the biggest stars in world football, the FIFA Best Awards did not get as much exposure as they could have got world wide. So it seems like a logical step from FIFA to make sure that these two super stars of world football are present in the future awards in order to get the maximum media exposure and world wide audience for the awards.
It would be interesting to see, what actions FIFA takes to ensure the presence of the top players in future awards and if they are successful in doing so.