It's that time of the year: the FIFA has announced its shortlist for the 2011 Ballon d'Or. Birgit Prinz is not on it! After a couple of years where she wasn't really one of the top players but got nominated nonetheless, she is now off the list. Is that a sign that Marta might not win this time? No Bajramaj or Grings on the list either - their fi-fa-faim was shortlived. Instead, we've got Kerstin Garefrekes for Germany, as a potential climax to her (now ended) international career. Some other usual suspects are there, and perhaps one or two surprises: Sonia Bompastor Kerstin Garefrekes Marta Aya Miyama Alex Morgan Louisa Necib Homare Sawa Lotta Schelin Hope Solo Abby Wambach Let's just give it to Sawa and have done with it? But then of course we'd miss all the fun at the awards ceremony in Zurich on 9 January. What will they all be wearing? (Garefrekes in an evening dress? The mind boggles... ) Nominees for "Women's coach of the year", to be awarded at the same event: Bruno Bini (France national team) Leonardo Cuellar (Mexico national team) Thomas Dennerby (Sweden national team) Patrice Lair (Olympique Lyonnais) Maren Meinert (Germany U-20 national team) Hope Powell (England national team) Norio Sasaki (Japan national team) Tom Sermanni (Australia national team) Pia Sundhage (USA national team) Jorge Vilda (Spain U-17 national team) The final decisions will be made by the captains and head coaches of the women’s national teams as well as by international media representatives selected by France Football. On 5 December, the top three in each category will be announced. (It's only then that Garefrekes might need to start panicking about her evening dress.) (My votes go to Sawa and Sasaki, but surely, that would be too easy?)
Hope Powell is a joke England are nearly back to route 1 football as featured in the world cup quarter final... Route 1 football is typical English football from the old time when the ball is lumped/hoofed to the big center forward.
As much as Sawa had a fantastic World Cup, I would like to know how she performed the rest of the year. Schelin had a good World Cup, won the CL (2nd best scorer), won the domestic title with Lyon and has been huge since the new season started, so she would deserve being at least among the last 3. Love Solo, but I'm not sure it would be deserved. Morgan: they should have a young player category, then she would totally get my vote. I like Miyama, she's a very talented player. To me, she has not developed all her potential... Maybe in a couple of years. Bompastor is an outstanding player, but they've never awarded a defender so far. Wambach also had a great year and was decisive at the World Cup. Garefrekes, the player you can count on, was definitely a satisfaction on the German team in my opinion, but doesn't deserve the nomination among the 10 this year. Nécib: are they kidding? She only managed a couple of tricks against two of the weakest teams of the World Cup, and was invisble the rest of the tournament. Not to mention she's played poorly with Lyon this season. Totally undeserved, one of the most overrrated player of Europe. Marta: are they gonna dare giving it to her again with her recent poor performances? My top 3 (in no particular order): Sawa, Schelin, Wambach. Coaches: Sasaki or Sundhage. Lair has many qualities, but also is fortunate to have a great team. Bini
Easy, but fair. Sawa was simply brilliant for Japan, while Sasaki during the knock out rounds of the WWC formulated three of the best tactically flexible displays the women's game has ever seen. Sawa's excellent form with Japan simply negates the need to add anything done at the club level. Only Schelin could come close to her with what she also produced for her club and country this year. On the coaching front I actually really like what Bruno Bini has done with France, with the inclusions of Jorge Vilda and Maren Meinert being a rare classy touch in the usually unimaginative FIFA short list (How does Hope Powell get any where near this list). All three of these coaches had their teams producing quality football at the very top of their respective levels of football.
I don't know whether to laugh hysterically at Dennerby making the list or to express outrage. It seems like outrage would take more effort, though.
Well he has a bronze medal, it is better than others coach on the list, he kinda deserves to be there
Hmm... Maren Meinert was justifiably on the list last year when her team won the U20 WWC, but she lost to Neid - who didn't achieve anything last year. But this year? I can only imagine that they wanted to have a German coach but couldn't possibly include Neid after the WWC disaster, or Schröder with his loss in the Champions League final, so they included Meinert instead, whose team at least won the U19 Euros (although some of the preparation was done by others while Meinert was on maternity leave).
LOL, she was better with France than with OL, but she was at the heart of everything that was good about the French style of football we saw in Germany. Considering how easily one after the other Necib made Canada, England, and U.S. midfields look slow and uncultured, I wouldn't say she's been that dramatically over hyped. Maybe she's not the worlds best yet, and I wouldn't have her in a top 10 list either, but she did far better in Germany than many older players who were considered light years ahead of her not so long ago. Marta while looking poor, was only poor compared to her ridiculously high standards, alongside two of the games best players finally performing to their absolute peaks as major parts to world class teams. Even though she's been obviously poor this year, Marta was actually still better than Wambach. It's sounds strange, but when you look at what both players have produced on the field of play, Marta still performed at a higher skill level than Wambach. If Wambach were to finish higher than Marta this year, then Inka Grings missing out on the top prize a few years back looks even more horrendous. While being a very important player to all things American, Wambach was still a far distance from the brilliance of Grings when she failed to even finish in the top 3 when up for FIFA's top prize. Sasaki or nobody. Sundhage has introduced nothing major to the women's game since taking over the US. She bullshit her way to a Olympic win, then three years later almost pulled out the same trick in Germany, but with all the resources where's the evolution? There were a host of quality coaching performances this year, from nations and teams with far less resources than what Sunhage had at her disposal. Why not look at somebody like Jorge Vilda for actually doing a fantastic job, while maintaining quality football with amazing results. Why is Sundhage so highly regarded for panic attack football, with her team playing one solid game all year and still managing to F that up too .
Thought I should share this tweet with you: 'Hope Solo played 13 full and 3 half games this year. That club and Country. Morgan is a sub. POTY or Fifa's masturbatory fantasies?' Sadly, I didn't write it. Explains why Necib beat Abily and/or Thiney into the list though...
Probably considering Necib abysmal work rate as demonstrated again on Saturday in the same manner as during the World Cup. To be fair her direct opponent on the day named Amy Lea didn't seem to bother either. No surprise both players got subbed in the game. Regarding Morgan she did make impact on multiple occasions and sometimes being decisive. For Hope Solo, it is probably like Marta and Prinz on previous occcasions, in there because of their name..
Of the USA players, while Morgan did make an impact in several games, if one was going to nominate said players mostly based on WWC play then why is Lauren Cheney not on the list? But, given the history of the women's FIFA POY award, are we really surprised at any silliness?
Teammates stick up for teammates, I guess. eta: I just took a quick surf through twitter. Too many USA based folks seem, let's go w/ new to the process, about the FIFA POY voting on the women's side. I guess folks out there don't remember the votes for players that were retired/injured once upon a time.
Sigh, I had started a thread about FIFA Women's player of the year/Ballon d'Or about a month ago on Women's international... Isn't there a way I can ask some moderator to somehow merge the two threads? Many interesting observations were made before the shortlist was revealed, and it would be cool confronting the names the people were foreseeing with the actual list of nominees, in the same thread... Anyway, I repeat what I was saying there: I guess Sawa should win the 1st place with no real contention, and I am very happy Miyama made top 10. I would like to have her even in top 3. And Sasaki for coaches. Too obvious? Well, ok, but, come on, have you ever seen such a performance as Nadeshiko Japan's one this year? And Sawa, Miyama and Sasaki were absolutely brilliant, for all the season, and they are undisputably great players and coach.
Women's International (a.k.a. Upstairs) is for serious news and discussion. In Rivalry we're allowed to bitch, gossip, and throw in gratuitous mentions of players' dogs without getting told off. At least, that's what some Very Important Moderator told me once.
See Batfink, we’ve got different visions. I totally agree on the fact that on a World Cup year, the tournament performances should count a lot in the decisions but to me, just reading the award’s title is enough to still make consider 2011 as a whole. So that’s why I wrote my comments speaking of 2011 and not only July 2011. About Necib, my critics are that she fore sure has a huge potential but she too often takes bad decisions and is rather unefficient 90% of the year. As Jenson said, other french players than her would have deserved to be on the list if they really wanted Frenchies. I agree on the fact that more experienced players failed to reach the expected level during the whole tournament, but do they nominate players because they accomplished something great or because they're less bad than others ? It’s Ballon d’or, not Ballon plaqué or... Agreed on Marta being at a higher skill level than Wambach. It’s only one dimension though, and Abby was more decisive than her. They’re different types of players anyway. Interesting that you mention Grings as I think that not having given her the Ballon d’or in 2009 was a big disgrace considering her performance year. I’m not seing such a gap between Marta and Abby’s year as I did in 2009 between Marta and Grings (clearly in favor of Grings at that time). I should have developped my point better about coaching. I added Sundhage alongside Nasaki because I tought she did very well when using her subs, which is part of great coaching. Every time she made a change during a game, the subbed-in player would have an impact (Rapinoe, Morgan), and she knew exactly when to make those changes. This compared to other coaches, who wouldn’t do it as well than she did. So that‘s to answer why Sundhage, certainly not the best coach of all-time, but a coach who, like Nasaki, can have results. About the panick football style, she tried possession football, but it wouldn’t work with her players on a regular basis. At least she adapted with what she had got. Anyway, I’m talking about 2011, and it may be different with coaches than with players as most of the list only had the World Cup to „shine“. But still talking about 2011 (I’m not minimzing the tremendous work Sasaki has been doing since 2008) I don’t see why we should talk about „evolution“ , and even less why mentionning the 2008 Olympics here. If we were talking about evolution through the years, then Sermanni would be a candidate as well. Vilda being on the list is positive as it means that they take into consideration what has been done with youth teams in general. @kool-aid: looking at history, no, not really surprised of the presence of silliness. Maybe of who are the silliness this year
Yep, where else would we be able to even contemplate Garefrekes in an evening dress? (And have a serious discussion about her merits too, if we feel like it: she played an amazing season for Frankfurt last year, as well as putting in a decent WWC performance by Germany's standards , so I'm perfectly happy to see her on the list as the only German player. In fact, I'm glad it's not Bajramaj.)
Another dimension that should be part of the picture is fairness as a player, where it seems to me that Abby has a bit of an edge over our Brazilian Diva.
As do mine. I dont think we had anything "new" this year outside of Japan and France. I think its : 3. Sonia Bompastor 2. Aya Miyama 1. Homare Sawa And nothing will change my mind.