Every British Ballon d’Or Winner [Ranked]
· GiveMeSport
Six British players have won the coveted Ballon d'Or, and they have all been ranked in order of their greatness
The Ballon d'Or is the single biggest individual award there is to win in European football. Ever since its introduction in 1956, the Golden Ball has been the standard-bearer for every great player who has and does make a living on the continent.
Winning it isn't something many can claim, which is exactly why so few names from the British Isles appear on the roll of honour. Six men from England, Scotland and Northern Ireland have, at some stage of their careers, held the title of the best player on the planet. Wales, unfortunately, is still waiting.
Ranking the greatest of that select group meant weighing up a number of different factors rather than picking a favourite.
Because these six played in such different eras, the following was taken into account when building the list:
British Ballon d'Or Winners [Ranked]
- 1. Bobby Charlton - 1966 - 2. George Best - 1968 - 3. Kevin Keegan - 1978 & 1979 - 4. Stanley Matthews - 1956 - 5. Denis Law - 1964 - 6. Michael Owen - 2001
While an incredible player at his peak, it is hard to argue that Michael Owen was a surprising recipient of this award. The four years prior had seen Ronaldo, Zinedine Zidane , Rivaldo and Luis Figo win the Ballon d'Or. The season that Owen won the award, Liverpool weren't even in the Champions League .
By today's standards, that gap alone would likely end his chances before voting even began, since a player with no real Champions League impact rarely gets serious consideration now. Even so, Owen deserves real credit: he saw off the likes of Raul and Oliver Kahn, both major names in their own right, to land the prize.
Long before Eric Cantona earned the nickname 'King of Old Trafford', Denis Law held that status. The Scot formed one third of Manchester United's famous Holy Trinity, alongside two players who feature elsewhere on this list.
Law was all about one thing. Goals. United signed him from Torino to add a ruthless streak up top and he most certainly did. The year he won the Ballon d'Or, he pipped some serious other candidates, including Jimmy Greaves and Eusebio, both of whom missed out on the top 3. Today, his legacy stands as one of Scotland's greatest-ever players .
He's the man who started it all. Stoke City and Blackpool great Sir Stanley Matthews was the very first player ever handed the Ballon d'Or. Born just a little later, he'd surely have had a role to play in England's 1966 World Cup triumph.
As it was, Matthews was already into his 50s by the time Sir Alf Ramsey guided the Three Lions to glory, having hung up his boots only a year earlier. Being the award's inaugural winner is enough to see him placed just ahead of Owen and Law here.
Britain's only ever two-time Ballon d'Or winner, and in consecutive years too. That is some going for Newcastle hero Kevin Keegan . The forward was a European Cup and First Division champion at Liverpool not long before he got ahold of the Golden Ball, but he was actually plying his trade in Germany when he was crowned the best player in the world.
He'd joined Hamburg back in 1977, and it was his second triumph there that carried more weight. Keegan cruised to victory over Bayern Munich's Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, who would then claim the award himself in each of the following two years.
"Pele called me the greatest footballer in the world. That is the ultimate salute to my life." Those were George Best 's words and perhaps one of the biggest compliments the Northern Irish hero could have been paid. Best's demons off the pitch are well-known and a sad story. But on the pitch, he was nothing but a fairytale.
Fear simply wasn't part of his game, and more often than not defenders were left with no answer for him. It didn't matter if six players stood between him and goal — his dribbling was good enough to leave them all for dead. The year he lifted the trophy, United's 'Busby Babes' had just won the club's first European Cup, a run in which Best played a vital part throughout.
Is he England's greatest-ever player? Is he Manchester United's? Both are debates that will run forever, but whichever way they land, Bobby Charlton 's name belongs in the conversation. A midfielder who scored like a natural-born striker, he once held the all-time scoring record for both his club and his country simultaneously.
He was also, alongside Bobby Moore, the most pivotal piece of the puzzle when England bought home the World Cup at Wembley Stadium, with his impact such that the legendary Franz Beckenbauer was given the job to man-mark his opposite number. Aside from his 1966 win, the European Cup winner also finished runner-up the following two years by the smallest of margins. As such, Charlton's place at number one is well and truly cemented.