{After years living in the shadow of Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo is expected to lift the 2013 Ballon d’Or at today’s award ceremony in Zurich, pipping the Argentine and Franck Ribery in the process.}
National team coaches and captains as well as journalists from around the world have voted for the winner, with an initial 23-man shortlist being reduced to three last month.
Messi is a contender to win the trophy for a fifth successive year, but few are talking about the Barcelona star this time, with Bayern Munich’s Ribery hoping his remarkable season at club level gives him the edge against the goalscoring exploits of Real Madrid and Portugal’s Ronaldo.
According to Daily Nation News, this year’s prize has been marred by a voting controversy, after the original November 15 deadline was extended by Fifa and co-organisers France Football magazine “on account of an insufficient number of votes having been received”.
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