The All Time Ballon d’Or Table: Ranking the 30 Most Successful Players

Span: 2008–2023
Nation: France
Nominations: 12
Wins: 1 (2022)
Podiums: 1
Normalized Points: 127

Karim Benzema had three ambitions in life when he set out on his career in professional soccer; buy his mother a house, join Real Madrid and win the Ballon d’Or. Tick, tick, tick.

Cristiano Ronaldo’s perennial sidekick blossomed into Madrid’s undisputed hero once the Portuguese phenom took his roadshow to Turin. While he had to do Ronaldo’s running, Benzema only cracked 30 goals in one of his first nine seasons at Madrid. Without that weight on his shoulders, the languid French star hit the 30-mark in four of his next five campaigns.

“People talk about Karim as a pure No. 9, a 9 and a half, a 10; for me, he’s a bit of everything,” Zinédine Zidane once gushed about his compatriot. “I would define him as a total footballer.”

Span: 1967–1970
Nation: Italy
Nominations: 4
Wins: 0
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 132

The vote for the 1969 Ballon d’Or winner was so close France Football decided to honor the two players who could only be separated by four points at the same time. Gianni Rivera would narrowly claim the gong ahead of Gigi Riva, yet it was Cagliari’s prolific striker who ended the day triumphantly.

The paper’s editor-in-chief, Max Urbini, had traveled to San Siro for Milan’s clash with Cagliari to hand out the Ballon d’Or four months after the vote. Despite coming out second best to the Rossoneri’s skipper in an individual sense, Riva would lead the Sardinians to the club’s first (and so far only) league title that month.

Span: 1989–2007
Nation: Italy
Nominations: 13
Wins: 0
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 138

No player has ever been nominated for the Ballon d’Or more often without winning it than Paolo Maldini. In fact, Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are the only two players to ever surpass his baker’s dozen of recognitions. That is a testament to the legendary AC Milan defender’s longevity which also plays into his warped perception of his own career.

“You know I’m the biggest loser in soccer,” Maldini told Christian Vieri during those best-forgotten COVID-19 lockdown days. “I lost three Champions League finals. A European Super Cup, three Intercontinental Club World Cup finals. I lost them, right? I lost a World Cup final, a European Championship final, a World Cup final. I can keep going.”

The Ballon d’Or would be another title which evaded Maldini, who seemed to overlook the seven league titles and five European Cups testing the structural integrity of his mantelpiece at home.

Span: 1997–2002
Nation: Brazil
Nominations: 6
Wins: 1 (1999)
Podiums: 1
Normalized Points: 139

Rivaldo’s greatest strength and weakness was his self confidence. The rubbery left-footer clambered to the peak of the sport fueled by an insistence that he had the necessary talent, but when that belief was realized with his Ballon d’Or win in 1999, he stopped taking the minimal advice which had slipped through his self-assurance.

Despite being crowned the best player on the planet while playing on the left wing, Rivaldo demanded a position change at Barcelona. “He wasn’t interested,” his manager Louis van Gaal would later lament. “He wanted to a No. 10.” Barça never won another title with Rivaldo through the middle.

Once his career had belatedly concluded after a circuitous swansong through Greece, Uzbekistan, Angola and back to Brazil, Rivaldo cursed his timing rather than his attitude. “If my time was today,” he pondered in 2015, “I’d bet with anyone that I would be the best player in the world two or three times. I’m sure I would score 50 goals per season.”

Span: 1991–1995
Nation: Bulgaria
Nominations: 5
Wins: 1 (1994)
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 153

Despite his initial reluctance, Hristo Stoichkov finally decided to meet Stéphane Saint-Raymond, France Football’s special correspondent, in the lobby of El Palace Hotel in Barcelona in 1994. “He introduced himself, took me aside, and asked me to pose with the Ballon d’Or trophy, but I refused because I’d heard they’d done the same thing with Paolo Maldini and Roberto Baggio, the other two favorites,” the striker with a fierce temper and stronger shot explained.

Saint-Raymond had to use all his powers of persuasion. “He closed the door behind me and said, with tears in his eyes: ‘I’m going to tell you a secret, promise me you won’t tell anyone,’” Stoichkov recalled. “‘You won the Ballon d’Or, here it is.’ I bent over it and saw my name engraved on it. I grabbed it and said to Stéphane, ‘Now I’m never letting go.’ I couldn’t stop crying.”

Considering all that Stoichkov had gone through in his career, overturning a life-time ban before escaping under the Iron Curtain to make it to Barcelona where he would form the sharpened tip of Johan Cruyff’s Dream Team, an outpouring of emotion was understandable.

Span: 1990–2001
Nation: Italy
Nominations: 6
Wins: 1 (1993)
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 158

There is something universal about the adoration for Roberto Baggio. Despite playing for Italy’s three traditional giants, his best moments came for Fiorentina, Bologna and Brescia, clubs outside the elite. This removed any sense of tribalism as a barrier to his accepted greatness.

Nothing unites the public like shared sympathy; Baggio’s most famous moment was also his lowest, blazing his penalty over the bar to lose the 1994 World Cup final for Italy against Brazil.

Beyond all that, it was Baggio’s supreme grace on the ball, a touch softer than candlelight which invariably helped him dance past befuddled goalkeepers, that made be so celebrated. As his former manager Aldo Agroppi wonderfully put it: “The angels sing, in his legs.”

Span: 1986–1999
Nation: West Germany/Germany
Nominations: 8
Wins: 1 (1990)
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 161

For a player widely hailed as one of the most significant in the history of German soccer, Lothar Matthaüs’s acclaim is not easily earned. The Bayern Munich icon was pilloried by his own fans for his perceived individual failure in the two European Cup finals he contested for the club, losing both in 1987 and 1999. (Bayern, it should be noted, were 1–0 up against Manchester United when he was substituted with 10 minutes to play.)

Matthaüs was a glorious all-rounder in midfield. “What made me strong was that I could do all sorts of things,” he surmised. Yet, even in the 1990 World Cup final which he did win, the penalty that Matthaüs opted not to take is still held up by some as an act of weakness.

Span: 1983–1993
Nation: Netherlands
Nominations: 7
Wins: 1 (1987)
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 165

When Ruud Gullit was crowned as the Ballon d’Or winner in 1987, he shifted the focus from his achievements for AC Milan to Nelson Mandela, dedicating his trophy to the wrongfully imprisoned face of the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa.

It was a remarkable act which opened the cause up to an entirely new audience in Italy, but one that Gullit described as “normal.” “I saw it as a human statement, not a political one.”

That is typical of a character who reveled in his uniqueness, dominating the technical Dutch game of the 1980s with his physical prowess and supreme tactical intelligence before embodying the revolutionary style Arrigo Saachi forged in Milan.

Span: 2017–2026
Nation: France
Nominations: 9
Wins: 0
Podiums: 1
Normalized Points: 168

No player has ever so openly coveted the Ballon d’Or without winning it as Kylian Mbappé. The French kid raised on copies of France Football spent his youth pining after the accolades gobbled up by Messi and Ronaldo.

“The Ballon d’Or is one of the major events for top players,” Mbappé has freely admitted. “We add it to our personal calendar and keep it in the back of our minds, of course.”

“We were all children once,” he continued. “And we’ve remained so, a little. Faced with this glittering trophy, we all become kids again. We all watched that ceremony with those red carpet arrivals and said to ourselves: One day, that will be me.”

Despite his best efforts, that day has not yet arrived for Mbappé.

“I don’t think anyone will come to me and tell me that my career was a failure because I didn’t win the Ballon d’Or,” he shrugged. “I’ll just feel unfulfilled because that dream wasn’t realized.”

Span: 1998–2006
Nation: Ukraine
Nominations: 8
Wins: 1 (2004)
Podiums: 3
Normalized Points: 171

Andriy Shevchenko was raised on the legends of his Ukrainian predecessors Oleg Blokhin and Igor Belanov winning the Ballon d’Or while still playing for the Soviet Union. Shevchenko became the face of his new nation, shining first for Dynamo Kyiv before claiming glory as the best in the world in 2004 with Milan. The jet-heeled striker dedicated his triumph to his country of birth and was greeted outside the France Football offices by his nation’s future president Viktor Yushchenko.

“The Ballon d’Or is an individual trophy that gives a very different feeling from a team trophy like the Champions League,” Shevchenko would explain. “I found myself having to take on a huge responsibility—for the future, for the younger generation, to pass on my experience.”

As one of the faces of Ukraine’s resistance after Russia’s invasion in 2022, Shevchenko had a lot of practice for his statesman role.

Span: 2002–2007
Nation: Brazil
Nominations: 6
Wins: 1 (2005)
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 173

On Nov. 19, 2005, Ronaldinho bewitched the Bernabéu, leaving Sergio Ramos with twisted intestines and Real Madrid’s home crowd on their feet doing the unthinkable; applauding a Barcelona player.

On Nov. 28, 2005, Ronaldinho was crowned a convincing Ballon d’Or winner.

The Brazilian’s beguiling style coincided with a technological transformation which saw his eminently clippable bursts of skill, the juggling and the jinking and ingenuity, spread across the internet. The first YouTube video to ever hit one million views was Ronaldinho clattering the ball against a crossbar.

Span: 1962–1973
Nation: Italy
Nominations: 10
Wins: 1 (1969)
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 184

When Gianni Rivera discovered that he had won the 1969 Ballon d’Or dished out by France Football, the acerbic Milan midfielder sniped: “Obviously, French newspapers don’t read the Italian press!”

Rivera became the Bête Noir of Gianni Brera, the omnipresent voice of Italian soccer who had bizarrely cast the slender playmaker as his arch-nemesis. Brera nicknamed Rivera L’Abatino, the young priest, as a way of belittling this skeletal figure. Milan’s captain was unfazed and set about defining an era with the Rossoneri which brought domestic and continental glory that Brera had to begrudgingly report.

There were admirers of Rivera beyond Italy and France. England’s World Cup winning manager Sir Alf Ramsey was asked to name Italy’s four strongest players in 1970, to which replied: “Rivera, Rivera, Rivera, Rivera.”

Span: 1956–1968
Nation: Soviet Union
Nominations: 10
Wins: 1 (1963)
Podiums: 1
Normalized Points: 188

Lev Yashin’s Ballon d’Or trophy in 1963 was the equivalent of Leonardo DiCaprio’s Best Actor Oscar for The Revenant. It was recognition of the glittering body of work which had gone before without acclaim rather than solely about the year in question.

The Soviet shot-stopper is the archetypal goalkeeper, with seemingly every custodian to subsequently put on a pair of gloves indelibly cast in the image of Yashin. Such is his enduring influence, the Ballon d’Or’s dedicated award for goalkeepers is named the Yashin Trophy.

The doyen of Dynamo Moscow racked up more than 200 clean sheets and supposedly saved a century of penalties. When Chile’s Eladio Rojas found the net against the Soviet Union at the 1962 World Cup he gushed: “Scoring past Yashin was like a trophy.”

Span: 1960–1971
Nation: England
Nominations: 9
Wins: 1 (1966)
Podiums: 3
Normalized Points: 192

Sir Bobby Charlton was not as impressed as his teammates when he learned of his Ballon d’Or triumph in 1966. Manchester United’s talismanic midfielder was still stewing over his club’s loss to Sheffield United when he heard the news bulletin on the team train.

“The radio announced that I had been voted the best European player,” he remembered. “I really didn’t feel like that player. It was a day of disappointment.” He would soon cheer up as the following day he played in a 2–0 win against that same Sheffield United side at Old Trafford.

Span: 2000–2009
Nation: France
Nominations: 9
Wins: 0
Podiums: 2
Normalized Points: 194

Many avid Premier League fans have questioned how the competition’s greatest player was never recognized globally for his unrivaled blend of grace and gusto. Thierry Henry came closest in 2003, narrowly missing out to Juventus’ Pavel Nedvěd despite being in the midst of an unbeaten league season with Arsenal.

The Frenchman had some of his own questions for the Ballon d’Or organizers. But they weren’t about himself. “I’d like to have an explanation of the fact that no Spaniard has won the Ballon d’Or over the last four years,” Henry scoffed during Spain’s run of international domination.

“The game is too focused on the individual. Stars are fine. But within the team, not without.”

Span: 1956–1962
Nation: France
Nominations: 6
Wins: 1 (1958)
Podiums: 4
Normalized Points: 211

Santiago Bernabéu, Real Madrid’s player, manager and president before his name was taken for their stadium, set out his image of the Galácticos in 1961: “Our policy up to now has been to contract a great international figure each season.” In 1956, that figure was Raymond Kopa.

The slight wisp of a winger had just led Reims to the European Cup final where they would lose to Real Madrid. Kopa swapped his red shirt for white after that defeat in Paris and proceeded to win the next three continental titles.

“Kopa did magic, amazing things that you didn’t think possible,” his Madrid teammate Juan Santisteban gushed. ‘Little Napoleon,’ as he was christened by Spanish media, even outshone the other stars on his team to collect the Ballon d’Or in 1958.

Span: 1958–1965
Nation: Spain
Nominations: 8
Wins: 1 (1960)
Podiums: 4
Normalized Points: 216

Modern Ballon d’Or ceremonies are like soccer’s Academy Awards; the best and the brightest resplendent in their black tie finery to see who has won this year’s popularity contest. It wasn’t always so glamorous.

“They gave me the trophy at a normal league game,” Luis Suárez, the great Spanish midfielder for Barcelona and Inter, recalled of his win in 1960. “Then I went home with the junk as though nothing had happened. There was no big dinner after I received it.”

It’s a shameful injustice that a schemer of Suárez’s caliber should have missed out on the acclaim afforded to his (largely inferior) successors.

Span: 1976–1979
Nation: England
Nominations: 4
Wins: 2 (1978, 1979)
Podiums: 3
Normalized Points: 237

The ultimate team player had little time for the individual accolades which his prodigious talent earned him. Kevin Keegan compared the surprisingly modest heft of his first Ballon d’Or prize to “a trophy from a pub darts competition” and left both golden balls to rot in his stuffed medal room.

“The metal is discolored and you can even see the glue where the plaque has been fixed on,” the former Liverpool and Hamburg icon told the ghost writer of his autobiography, Daniel Taylor. “I had it valued once and the guy took one look before telling me it was worth a tenner. I doubt Cristiano would use it as a doorstep.”

Span: 1967–1976
Nation: West Germany
Nominations: 10
Wins: 1 (1970)
Podiums: 4
Normalized Points: 238

One of the figureheads of Gerd Müller’s great Dutch rivals of the era, Johan Cruyff, once said, “Playing football is very simple, but playing simple football is the hardest thing there is.” Müller mastered that art of simplicity.

In seemingly every match he played, for either Bayern Munich or West Germany, ‘Der Bomber’ would end the game with at least one goal. It’s been half a century and the records he set still stand, every generation of striker striving and failing to replicate the simple act of putting the ball in the back of the net.

Müller had a typically straightforward explanation for his brilliance: “My secret was aiming for the spot the goalkeeper couldn’t reach.” As the generations that have followed will surely attest, that sounds simpler than it is.

Span: 1995–2005
Nation: Brazil
Nominations: 9
Wins: 2 (1997, 2002)
Podiums: 4
Normalized Points: 241

The most remarkable quality about Ronaldo’s glittering career is that he spent most of it playing within himself.

Between November 1999 and September 2001 he could only muster six minutes of competitive action while recovering from an injury which sent his kneecap into the middle of his thigh. From that point onward, Ronaldo would still win the World Cup and his second Ballon d’Or, muzzling the fiercest defenses on the planet with a combination of power and panache few center forwards have ever possessed.

Yet, before his knee exploded (twice), Ronaldo was even better. His solitary season at Barcelona was a masterpiece, rattling in 47 goals in 49 games before becoming the youngest Ballon d’Or winner ever. “That was the most difficult marking job I’ve done in my life,” Tenerife’s Cesar Gomez breathlessly said after coming up against him. “I feel like I’ve just played five games.”

Ronaldo looked like he was running down the airport travelator while everyone else was trudging to the terminal weighed down by three pieces of hand luggage. “Can anybody, anywhere, show me a better player,” his manager Sir Bobby Robson asked. The answer was “no.”

Span: 1986–1992
Nation: Netherlands
Nominations: 6
Wins: 3 (1988, 1989, 1992)
Podiums: 3
Normalized Points: 268

Marco van Basten’s star shone bright but briefly. As much as he looked like the prototype for a striker; towering, strong, fast and supple, the Ajax and Milan icon was eventually let down by his body.

Dutch fans unfurled a banner before the 1988 European Championship final in which he would score and win that read: “And on the eighth day, God created Marco.” Unfortunately, He gave him a dodgy ankle.

Van Basten’s maniacal work ethic, inspired by a deep-seated desire to please his abusive father, underpinned his glittering rise to the summit of the sport. But his body would break down under the toll, forcing him to play his last game aged 28. Looking back on the pain he would suffer through in retirement, Van Basten admitted: “It’s not worth it.”

Span: 1956–1961
Nation: Spain
Nominations: 5
Wins: 2 (1957, 1959)
Podiums: 3
Normalized Points: 272

Darcy Silveira dos Santos, or Canário as he was more commonly known, had the distinction of playing with the great Pelé for Brazil before joining Alfredo Di Stéfano at Real Madrid. “They were the best,” he would reflect. “But Alfredo was more complete. He was the number one.”

It’s remarkable praise and an opinion echoed by many who had the pleasure of watching the ‘Blonde Arrow’ in the flesh. They would have seen a constant blur of white, with Di Stéfano free to roam across every blade of grass on the turf in his tunnel vision quest for success.

“I think nothing of popping up at center half or fullback, to cover a colleague who has had to leave his position,” he outlined. “We are all soccer players, and as such should be able to perform competently in all 11 positions.”

There are players and there is Di Stéfano.

Span: 1996–2006
Nation: France
Nominations: 11
Wins: 1 (1998)
Podiums: 3
Normalized Points: 284

“I’ve never been the type to say, ‘I deserve this or that.’ But with that Ballon d’Or in 1998, I was showing off a bit,” Zinédine Zidane recalled years later. “It wasn’t really me, but I really wanted to win it.” After scoring two goals as France beat Brazil to win the World Cup in Paris, there was little chance of Zidane’s ambitions going unfulfilled.

The confines of the English language can only capture a fraction of the mastery Zidane exuded from every pore during his playing days. The British commentator Brian Moore could be forgiven for getting tongue-tied when listing the midfielder’s abundance of attributes while reporting on the 2002 Champions League final: “Well you know what the French say about Zinédine Zidane; strength of a bear, mind of a fox and... a great engine.”

This was a player who transcended the sport, inspiring philosophical essays, flowery poetry and even a feature-length film soundtracked by Mogwai.

Span: 1978–1985
Nation: West Germany
Nominations: 8
Wins: 2 (1980, 1981)
Podiums: 3
Normalized Points: 288

One of those players seemingly lost to the modern era, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge’s achievements should be more widely lauded. His brother Michael may be a biased witness, but his description of “Kalle” as “the 20th century version of Cristiano Ronaldo” is not wildly inaccurate.

Rummenigge was a winner, with Bayern Munich, Inter and Germany, who scooped up mountains of silverware thanks largely to a remorseless eye for goal. The striker moved with an exactness more reminiscent of clockwork than a fallible human being, conquering all before him until it was lost in the fog of time.

Span: 1961–1973
Nation: Portugal
Nominations: 11
Wins: 1 (1965)
Podiums: 3
Normalized Points: 289

Decades after the 1966 Ballon d’Or ceremony, Eusébio still hadn’t forgiven Fernando Couto e Santos.

“I could have won two Ballons d’Or,” he fumed years later, looking back at the prize he lost to Sir Bobby Charlton by the finest of margins. “One point. And the vote was from a Portuguese journalist, Couto e Santos, from Mundo Desportivo. He always told me he voted for Charlton because he thought I would win easily.”

The top scorer at that summer’s World Cup had been rightly crowned the year before and would spend more than a decade revered as one of the greatest forwards to ever walk the Earth. Eusébio won 11 league titles with Benfica and lost just six home games in 15 years, propelled by an insatiable appetite for success which some journalists failed to appreciate.

Span: 1967–1978
Nation: Netherlands
Nominations: 12
Wins: 3 (1971, 1973, 1974)
Podiums: 4
Normalized Points: 404

Johan Cruyff was a wonderfully gifted player, an ingenious manager, a tactical visionary and a symbol for multiple cultural movements across Europe. He was a scorer and a creator, a gifted talent spotter and an unsuccessful pig farmer. But above everything else, Cruyff was a contrarian.

Honed in the school of conflict taught by his great Ajax manager Rinus Michels, Cruyff sought success through the sparks of disagreement. It’s enjoyably fitting then, that one of the most successful players in the history of the Ballon d’Or should have such disdain for the award.

“It doesn’t interest me at all because it is an assembly of journalists,” he huffed to RAC1 in 2014. “What’s the criteria? The best, the best of the season... Everybody pulls for their favorites and there are times when you think, What is the point of it all? Let them do whatever they want.” Invariably, they wanted to crown Cruyff the best.

Span: 1976–1986
Nation: France
Nominations: 11
Wins: 3 (1983, 1984, 1985)
Podiums: 5
Normalized Points: 432

It’s appropriate that the first recipient of the Ballon d’Or trophy in its modern guise, that glorious life-sized golden soccer ball, should have been given to Michel Platini in 1983. The ruthless playmaker would claim the gong in three consecutive years as the heartbeat of two historic Juventus and France sides.

“I bought him for the cost of a slice of bread,” Juve’s former owner Gianni Agnelli liked to say, “and he spread foie gras on it.”

Platini was the side’s No. 10 and its most reliable source of goals, dictating the game from his velvety throne as the Italian giants won all before them. The former Saint-Étienne starlet also shone on the international stage, orchestrating France’s euphoric European Championship triumph in 1984.

Michel Hidalgo, Les Bleus’ manager for that success, gushed: “When you have a Platini with you, everything seems easier. He appears to be playing with a remote-controlled ball. Even his feet are intelligent.”

Span: 1965–1976
Nation: West Germany
Nominations: 12
Wins: 2 (1972, 1976)
Podiums: 5
Normalized Points: 446

Franz Beckenbauer was a force of nature. “When he walked into the room, it was like the light came on,” his long-serving Bayern Munich and West Germany teammate Uli Hoeneß once said.

The man nicknamed ‘Der Kaiser’—the Emperor—carried himself with a regal air, upright, chest out, not so much running as gliding around the turf. Beckenbauer floated above the pitch, entirely untroubled when even the mention of rain turned the turf of the 1960s and ’70s to a swamp.

“He seemed arrogant,” the Dutch playmaker Willem van Hanegem, who lost the 1974 World Cup final to Beckenbauer, recalled, “but that was just because of his style of play. Everything was easy for him.”

Span: 2004–2022
Nation: Portugal
Nominations: 18
Wins: 5 (2008, 2013, 2014, 2016, 2017)
Podiums: 12
Normalized Points: 745

The former editor-in-chief of France Football, Pascal Ferré, who took great pleasure in dishing out the award for years, incited the ire of Cristiano Ronaldo when he sensationally claimed in 2021: “Ronaldo has only one ambition, and that is to retire with more Ballons d’Or than Messi. And I know that because he has told me.”

Ronaldo strongly refuted such claims but the fact that they were so easily accepted by so many spoke to his public perception of chasing after individual recognition.

The former Manchester United and Real Madrid superstar had the misfortune of blossoming into one of the game’s greatest ever players at just the same time as Messi. Two years before the pair shared five titles across a single decade Twitter was launched. The digital town square soon became the perfect medium for endless slanging matches between one-eyed fans of either player.

In the perennial argument to establish the greatest of all time, the Ballon d’Or became the ultimate scoreboard. Regrettably for Ronaldo, he would be condemned as the runner-up.

Span: 2006–2023
Nation: Argentina
Nominations: 17
Wins: 8 (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2015, 2019, 2021, 2023)
Podiums: 14
Normalized Points: 894

The best thing about Lionel Messi’s unprecedented domination of every individual award going is his scarcely disguised disinterest for the whole process.

“It’s not that it doesn’t interest me, but, let’s just say, that I don’t attach much importance to all that,” he told the organizers of the award he has lifted more than anyone else. “It doesn’t change anything for me whether I’m the best or not. And I’ve never sought to be either.”

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