The Ballon d’Or raises the standard of Spanish football twice, rewarding Rodri and Aitana Bonmati | Football | Sport

The night when a Spanish footballer won the Ballon d’Or again, 64 years after the only man, Luis Suarez in 1960, and when Spain’s Aitana Bonmati won her second in a row, also produced an extremely rare night for Spanish football when the team ” Real Madrid” knows that the magazine France Footballnow collaborating with UEFA, was not going to crown Vinicius.

The seduction caused by Spain’s performance in the last EuroCup received recognition at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris that the golden generation – two Eurocups and a World Cup – did not receive. Rodrigo Hernandez (Madrid, 28), who took to the stage on crutches after tearing the anterior cruciate ligament and meniscus in his right knee last month, won the Ballon d’Or: “This is a victory not only for me, but for Spanish football and for many players who deserved it but did not win, such as Xavi, Iniesta, Iker, Busi…” he said. “This is a victory for Spanish football and, above all, for the midfielder figure. Our work is more unclear, but today it has become known.”

The votes of 100 journalists from the respective countries that crowned him placed four more team members among the top 15: Carvajal (4), Lamin Yamal (8), Dani Olmo (13) and Nico Williams (15).

Lamin also won the Copa for Young Person of the Year on a night that also recognized Jenny Hermoso’s fight to make football a safe place for women with the Socrates Award.

At the gala, 26-year-old Aitana Bonmati was once again named the best player in the world, marking the fourth Ballon d’Or in a row for the Spanish footballer after two of her Barça teammates Alexia Putellas: “This cannot be achieved alone. “I’m very grateful and very lucky to have great players around me to help me continue to develop and become better,” she said. And she remembered what binds her to the earth, despite the fact that she so often touches the sky: “I am a man of the people. I still live in the same city where I was born, with my people. “It makes me feel like the same person I was 15 years ago, and that’s what makes me feel good and happy.” Completing the podium for the women’s award were her teammates Carole Graham Hansen and Salma Paralluelo.

It’s normal that Barça won the award for the best women’s club of the year. How Madrid hosted the men’s team. But there was no one in the theater to take it away, no Carlo Ancelotti to receive the best coach award, no Kylian Mbappe, no Gerd Müller as the top scorer equal to Harry Kane.

The warning that Vinicius would not win sparked a radical response from Madrid, which scrapped its planned expedition to Paris on Monday morning. They believed that if the award had gone to a non-Brazilian, and if winning the European Cup had taken precedence over the Champions League, as they understood Rodri to have, then Dani Carvajal should have led the way, lifting two trophies and also being voted MVP. in the Wembley final. “It is clear that the UEFA Ballon d’Or winner does not respect Real Madrid. And Real Madrid is not where it is not respected,” the club said. Late Monday night, Vinicius wrote on his X (Twitter) account: “I’ll do it 10 times if necessary. “They’re not ready.”

The decision shook the atmosphere around the gala, which had been kept secret for much longer than usual. According to tradition, France Football arranged a photo shoot and interview for the winner a few days before the award, but this year it was not the case. After learning of Madrid’s decision, the organization told Efe that it considered the club’s notorious sit-in, chaired by Florentino Perez, “incomprehensible.”

Rodri’s absence on the day when he could be crowned upset Luis de la Fuente: “It is not good for football that an organization like Real Madrid is not present at a gala with such characteristics,” the coach said.

Rodri, De la Fuente’s compass, felt overwhelmed by having found his way of understanding football at the height of Spanish football’s golden age: “It coincided with the boom of tactical football, Guardiola and the Spanish team. ..”, he said a few years ago in an interview with EL PAÍS. This transformation led to three major titles in a row: the 2008 and 2012 European Championships and the 2010 World Cup. When they won the first cup, the Madrid man was 12 years old and already involved in tactical debates with his coaches in Atlético’s youth team. team. Ten years later, already in the first team of the red and white club after a spell at Villarreal, when he found himself at the crossroads of choosing what kind of football he wanted to play, he chose Guardiola, leaving behind Simeone and 70 million euros at the Met .

Also a football debate with the Argentine and some of his teammates. Rodrigo argued that the team ran too much and explained that when he secured the pass, he did so so that they could rest and be well prepared for the next attack. “This is how we play here,” he was told many times. And he wanted to play differently.

This is why he emigrated to Manchester in the summer of 2019, despite being lured by the idea that Simeone could perfect his defensive game. But he has already provided this service. In the previous season at Villarreal he was already the player with the most recoveries in the league, and last season at Atlético Madrid he led his team in this division. From a very early age, Rodri looked at football differently, seeking an advantage in understanding the board: “I saw that if I could understand the game, I would have a big advantage over my opponents, and even more so in those eras when there are not so many concepts “, he explained in EL PAÍS.

Therefore, at the moment when he decided on the direction of his future career, he chose Guardiola, with whom not everything was perfect from the very beginning, as Laporte recalled in an interview with EL PAÍS in 2023: “I remember his first year that I was half lost and wanted do too many things. And now he makes everything perfect. “He understands the game, knows where the spaces are, doesn’t lose the ball…”

The conversation took place on the eve of the victory in the Nations League final with Spain. That night, Rodri marked the victory as the first important part to start a new cycle like the one that made him choose his path: “Winning will be important to create a winning culture,” he said after being chosen as the tournament’s most valuable player. final. The linebacker was launched. Eight days ago he won the Champions League in Istanbul with City, scoring the winner in a 1-0 victory in a final in which he was also named most valuable player. That year he seemed even more destined to win the Ballon d’Or, but Messi won the World Cup in Qatar in December to claim his eighth trophy.

This was a new summit of Spanish football this year.