Global football governing body, FIFA’s award of Barcelona’s Lionel Messi as the best player of the year 2019, is being questioned by several coaches, players and pundits, in a rare voting controversy.
Argentina forward Messi beat Liverpool defender Virgil van Dijk and five-time winner Cristiano Ronaldo to win the best FIFA player of the year award for a record sixth time on Monday.
But by Wednesday, the Egyptian football association, Sudan’s coach and Nicaragua’s captain had questioned the legitimacy of Messi’s win, citing uncounted or misallocated votes.
The Egyptian Football Association (EFA) on Tuesday asked Fifa to explain why the votes of its national coach and the captain were not taken into account.
Coach Shawki Ghareeb and captain Ahmed El-Mohammadi, are not mentioned in FIFA’s publication of votes after the ceremony on Monday.
“The Egyptian Football Federation officially sent Egypt’s vote to Fifa on 15 August, four days before the deadline,” read part of a statement published on its social networks late Tuesday.It “asks Fifa why the Egyptian vote was not accepted” and has decided to open an “investigation” into the circumstances of this failure.
On Wednesday, Sudan’s coach Zdravko Lugarisic and Nicaragua’s captain Juan Barrera took to social media to say that the votes published by FIFA, in their names, did not reflect their choices.
Lugarisic says his first choice was Egypt’s Mohamed Salah, while the FIFA website showed Messi as his top pick.
Barrera also insists that he did not vote for Messi, as claimed by FIFA;
‘‘I did not vote for Messi. I was surprised to be on the list of captains who voted for Messi and there is no explanation how it appeared there,’‘ Barrera reportedly said.
FIFA determines the best players based on the votes of national team coaches, captains as well as a journalist from each country, and publishes the results on its website.
Excerpt of text from Africanews.com
