Cristiano Ronaldo becomes FIFA's best player of 2016

Cristiano Ronaldo becomes FIFA's best player of 2016. January. 11, 2017 08:43. by Jong-Seok Lee wing@donga.com. Cristiano Ronaldo has made it again. Ronaldo was picked as the best male player at the FIFA's "The Best Football Awards 2016" held in Zurich, Switzerland on Tuesday, proving it was his best year in 2016. The award is new after Ballon d'Or departed from FIFA Ballon d'Or that FIFA had jointly awarded with football magazine France Football from 2010 to 2015. Ronaldo won the Ballon d'Or in December last year.

Ronaldo led Portugal's first win at the Euro 2016, and also put his team Real Madrid on top of the 2016 UEFA Champions League. At the finals of Club World Cup held in Japan in December last year, he displayed a head trick show that gave Real Madrid a victory trophy. 2016 was his best year.

Perhaps due to such overwhelming performance, Ronaldo was not shy as said he said, "I did I had no doubts I would be able to get it" while delivering an award accepting speech. He called 2016 “the best year of my career," adding, “I don’t really have anything to say because awards speak for themselves.” Following the Ballon d'Or award in December, Ronaldo swept trophies in year-end awards including the "European Player of the Year" voted by media in 27 European countries, as well as "Globe Soccer Award" jointly given by the European Football.

At the Football Awards vote, Ronaldo got 34.5 percent, beating Lionel Messi who got 26.5 percent. Antoine Griezmann ranked third with 7.5 percent, Neymar 6.2 percent and ranking fourth, followed by Luis Suarez at fifth with 5.1 percent. The top five were all in the Spain Primera Liga. Football Awards are voted by managers and coaches of each national team, press reporters and football fans. Five points are given to No.1 and three points to No. 2, and one point to No. 3. Coach Uli Stielike of the Korean national football team gave Gareth Bale No. 1 ranking and Ronaldo third ranking. Team captain Ki Seung-yong gave No. 1 ranking vote to Messi and No. 2 vote to Ronaldo. The best female player at the Football Awards was Carli Lloyd from U.S. national team.