It is, without exaggeration, the dawning of a new era in Paris tonight. For the first time since 2003, there will be a Ballon d’Or presented with neither Lionel Messi nor Cristiano Ronaldo among the shortlisted nominees. A maiden winner of football’s most coveted individual prize is guaranteed.
Father Time has decreed it is the turn of the next generation and a glitzy ceremony at the Theatre du Chatelet in France’s capital will finally see new footballing royalty anointed.
Vinicius Junior is the overwhelming favourite following his dazzling 2023-24 season at Real Madrid. Supporters inside the Bernabeu sang, “Ballon d’Or, Vinicius Ballon d’Or,” on repeat after the 24-year-old scored a hat-trick in a 5-2 win over Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League last week, a repeat of June’s final when he also found the net in a 2-0 victory.
Real Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti needed no further convincing. “Vinicius Jr will win the Ballon d’Or in my opinion,” he told reporters in the wake of last week’s hat-trick. “He will get the award.”
That is the expectation of most observers, yet his competitors have claims of their own. Rodri, the sidelined midfielder of Manchester City, drove Spain towards glory at Euro 2024 and Jude Bellingham’s decorated debut campaign with Real Madrid was also worthy of worldwide acclaim.
It means we will almost certainly have a Ballon d’Or winner in their twenties for the first time since 2015. Closing the book on Messi and Ronaldo presents the opportunity for a new figure to be elevated to the most elite level. The football world will be watching, as will those eager to attach themselves to the next great.
“Commercially, it’s going to be a bit of a statement,” says Owen Laverty, chief innovation officer at Ear to the Ground, a leading sports and entertainment marketing agency based in Manchester.
“The 2026 World Cup (in the United States, Canada and Mexico) is going to be big from a commercial perspective and all the briefs we’d get as an agency ask who the horses are that they should be backing. This is the first indicator of that, a shift from the previous age.”
Winning the Ballon d’Or does not bring direct financial reward (there is no prize money on offer), but it serves as an emphatic endorsement, a surefire way to take their image to the next level. That, inevitably, brings improved sponsorship deals and spiked levels of interest.
Tonight’s winner, in all likelihood, will be assured of a windfall agreed long ago. Boot deals for players at the highest level commonly have a clause that is triggered should they win the Ballon d’Or, a mutually beneficial arrangement that acts as a toast of success. Memorabilia arrangements, too, will suddenly carry greater value if signed by the world’s best player.
“Most players will have a clause in their boot contracts that if they win the Ballon d’Or, they’ll get a big bonus out of it,” says Ehsen Shah, chief executive of B-Engaged, an international sports marketing agency.
“That’ll be the only commercial deal where winning the Ballon d’Or will categorically get you this, but you do get other endorsement deals where your value goes higher.
“The companies that sign you up will pay more for you because you’re deemed to be the best player in the world. Everyone wants the best player in the world’s autographed boots or shirts.
“They’re the only two directly impacted ones and all the other ones are subjective over whether a brand will go with that person or not because of what they’ve achieved.
“There’s no chronological way to say that Pepsi, for example, will only go with the Ballon d’Or winner. You can try to demand more in the market, but you can only charge what the brands are willing to pay. Is anyone swayed that much by the Ballon d’Or? That’s subjective.”
And largely untried. Only Luka Modric (2018) and Karim Benzema (2022) have broken the Messi and Ronaldo duopoly since the latter won the first of his five awards as a Manchester United player in 2008. Vinicius Jr, already a poster boy for Nike, is primed to be the next test case.
“The big unknown talk about is the commercial impact of winning it,” says Laverty. “We believe it makes a difference but it’s untested.
“For the last 15 years, we’ve only had two players who weren’t Messi or Ronaldo. Benzema won it but then couldn’t play in the 2022 World Cup and went to Saudi Arabia. There was a burst of commercial interest in him but it dissipated so fast that it’s hard to prove through that theory.
“Where it’s clear there is a commercial impact is the Ballon d’Or Feminin (the women’s prize). People don’t know the players as well and they almost need to be told who is the best.
“It was a really useful tool in the marketing and brand world because it was a shortcut. Straight away, Aitana Bonmati (last year’s winner) became a name that people wanted to be involved with.”
The reality is that the best male footballers, such as Vinicius Jr, Rodri, Bellingham, Kylian Mbappe, Erling Haaland and Lamine Yamal, already have a well-stocked roster of brand partnerships. Coming this far in their careers has attracted multiple seven-figure deals. Their faces are already well known.
The Ballon d’Or, though, can still make a difference.
“If you were working with the Ballon d’Or winner, you’d be looking at increasing commercial deals by at least 25 to 50 per cent,” adds Shah. “You’ll be able to align with that narrative that you’re working with the best and that’s all backed up with an award. LeBron James has done that very well over the years (in the NBA). His brand partners are aligned with that elite, record-breaking, GOAT marketing.”
The Ballon d’Or became a very different trophy to chase in the age of Messi and Ronaldo. It has always been a worthy prize, going back to its first winner in 1956, Englishman Stanley Matthews at the ripe old age of 41, but its significance has grown in an era defined by two relentless individuals.
Messi and Ronaldo won 13 out of 15 Ballons d’Or between 2008 and 2023 and that rivalry has left a lasting impact.
“The cult of the personality is stronger than it’s ever been,” says Ged Colleypriest, a sports marketing expert. “The rise of the Ballon d’Or coincides with the social media age, the constant debate over who is the GOAT. The Ballon d’Or has become a validation of that.
“It’s used to compare individuals and it’s become much bigger in this social media age where we have this need to say who is better than someone else. Whether you agree with the outcome or not, the Ballon d’Or has become part of the conversation.
“We’ve reached the post-Messi and Ronaldo era now and that spikes a bit of intrigue with the new pretenders to the throne.”
Messi and Ronaldo have undeniably made the Ballon d’Or matter. Or, at least, more than it used to.
Mbappe has spoken openly of his ambition to win the big prize and some major transfers, such as Anthony Martial’s move to Manchester United from Monaco in 2015, include an add-on clause should the player win a Ballon d’Or.
The title itself, French for ‘golden ball’, has entered footballing parlance. Pundits talk of an intangible, mythical Ballon d’Or level, stirring debate around a player’s capabilities. TNT’s Rio Ferdinand opted simply to repeat the award’s name nine times as Vinicius Jr netted in the Champions League final at Wembley in a 30-second clip that would later go viral.
Everyone watching that Vinicius Jnr performance… pic.twitter.com/Gsy4t4SbY2
— Football on TNT Sports (@footballontnt) October 22, 2024
It is hard to imagine anyone having the same immediate thought about Zinedine Zidane as he was winning the 1998 World Cup with France, but football’s focus falls increasingly upon the individual.
“If we were having a conversation, even 20 years ago, and we were talking about the greatest players of all time, we’d be listing the number of titles they had won,” says Laverty.
“I’m not sure at any point we’d have said, ‘And he’s got three Ballon d’Ors and he’s only got one’. That’s always been an NBA, NFL parlance. You’d say a player had X titles, X MVPs and then stack it up. That’s becoming more commonplace in football with the Ballon d’Or.
“All the research we’ve done is that it will continue moving towards the NFL/NBA model, where personal stats and accolades become really important because it demonstrates success for that person. The Ballon d’Or matters to younger fans.”
The shift matters, too. A new MVP in American sports can have commercial power strengthened overnight and those awards have traditionally counted for much more than a Ballon d’Or. Football’s subtle change, where players can be followed as much as teams by younger supporters, means individual honours bring greater validation. And if the Ballon d’Or carries a heightened significance for younger fans, it also does for brands eyeing up key partnerships.
“When you get the MVP in the NBA, there’s a completely different influx in how brands perceive you,” says Shah. “In the NBA culture, you’ve got the broadcast going on and in every ad break, there’s an NBA player in there. We don’t necessarily have that culture in Europe.
“The market has moved on now. You’ve got Mbappe with a good roster of brands, Bellingham with a good roster of brands, Vinicius and Yamal. Their commercial work has already been done.
“Those brands are all banking on that player becoming a Ballon d’Or winner.”
Do not write off Messi and Ronaldo, football’s commercial behemoths, especially with neither ruling out a last dance at the 2026 World Cup. Yet the name read out in Paris tonight will give the strongest indication yet of where the line of succession will lead.
(Top photos: Getty Images; design: Eamonn Dalton)
