Two Manchester City stars nominated for Ballon d’Or award

Manchester City striker Sergio Aguero and midfielder Kevin De Bruyne have been nominated for the 2018 Ballon d’Or award, alongside several other superstars. The two Sky Blues are being recognised for their role in the City team that dominated England last term and their respective national teams.

Aguero was City’s key man upfront in a season, where the Argentine also became the club’s all-time top goalscorer.

De Bruyne was City’s best player by far last term, and also reached the semi-finals of the 2018 World Cup helping Belgium to a third-place finish. He was beaten to the PFA Player of the Year award by Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah, whose goalscoring exploits took the Premier League and even Europe by storm.

The Egyptian is also joined in the Ballon d’Or list by teammates Roberto Firmino and Sadio Mané as their goals fired the Reds to the Champions League final.

The list is understandably dominated by Real Madrid and the French national team players as they won the Champions League and the World Cup respectively.

It would be recalled that Real Madrid and Croatian midfielder Luka Modric won both the UEFA and FIFA Best Player awards last month, due to his role in the Madrid and Croatian national team midfield. He had initially won the most valuable player award at the World Cup, thereby carting home the Golden Ball.

It is however, noteworthy that the 33-year-old was not in the conversation for both the UEFA and FIFA awards until his role in helping Croatia reach the World Cup final. Even though he ended up not winning the competition, opinion quickly shifted in his favour as serial winners Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi made early exits from the tournament. That makes him favorite for the Ballon d’Or as well. But it remains to be seen if this award will defer from the two he has already won.

Here’s a list of the nominees for the award:

Sergio Aguero (ARG / Manchester City)

Alisson (BRA / Liverpool)

Gareth Bale (WAL / Real Madrid)

Karim Benzema (FRA / Real Madrid)

Edinson Cavani (URU / PSG)

Thibaut Courtois (BEL / Chelsea)

Cristiano Ronaldo (POR / Juventus)

Kevin De Bruyne (BEL / Manchester City)

Roberto Firmino (BRA / Liverpool)

Diego Godin (URU / Atlético Madrid)

Antoine Griezmann (FRA / Atlético Madrid)

Eden Hazard (BEL / Chelsea)

Isco (SPA / Real Madrid)

Neymar (BRA / PSG)

Jan Oblak (SLO / Atlético Madrid)

Paul Pogba (FRA / Manchester United)

Harry Kane (ENG / Tottenham)

N’Golo Kanté (FRA / Chelsea)

Hugo Lloris (FRA / Tottenham)

Mario Mandzukic (CRO / Juventus Turin)

Sadio Mané (SEN / Liverpool)

Marcelo (BRA / Real Madrid)

Kylian Mbappé (FRA / PSG)

Lionel Messi (ARG / FC Barcelone)

Luka Modric (CRO / Real Madrid)