Sam Kerr second in 2023 Ballon d’Or voting

There was only ever going to be one winner of the 2023 Ballon d’Or award, with Barcelona’s Aitana Bonmatí the nailed-on favorite after winning La Liga, winning the UEFA Women’s Champions League (and named the competition’s best player), and winning the 2023 Women’s World Cup with Spain as well (and being named the competition’s best player for good measure).

So it was a race for second for the other 29 nominees. And that race was won by none other than Sam Kerr, living legend! This is the highest Kerr’s ever finished in the Ballon d’Or voting, after back-to-back third place finishes last season and the season before. Congrats!

Chelsea’s other nominees, Millie Bright and Guro Reiten finished 11th and 19, respectively, with Bright, who captained England to the World Cup final, actually the highest placed defender of all.

Congrats to them as well!

On the men’s side, Lionel Messi won his eighth and presumably last Ballon d’Or, with treble-winner Erling Haaland probably wondering if he could’ve ever scored enough goals to eclipse Messi’s historic World Cup campaign and now also being America’s soccer messiah.

Jude Bellingham won the under-21 award (Kopa Trophy) while Emiliano Martínez got the goalkeeper award.

Former Chelsea players Kevin De Bruyne, Mohamed Salah, and Jamal Musiala finished 4th, 11th, and 26th, respectively, in the men’s Ballon d’Or voting. Thibaut Courtois was fourth in the Yashin Trophy rankings.