Alexia Putellas Becomes First Spanish-Born Player To Win Ballon D’Or Twice

FC Barcelona’s Alexia Putellas has tonight become the first woman to win the coveted Ballon D’Or award on two occasions. Having won the award last year, Putellas will also go down in history as the first woman to ever retain the honor and equals the Argentine-born Alfredo Di Stéfano as a two-time winner for Spain.

The award comes in spite of Putellas being injured since July and unlikely to play again for the coming months. Such was Putellas’ form in the first half of the year, where she led Barcelona to a domestic treble of league, cup and Super Cup that she finished ahead in the voting of Arsenal’s Beth Mead, the top scorer and player of the tournament for the European champions England at the UEFA Women’s Euro this summer.

Putellas’ form in the UEFA Women’s Champions League was no less extraordinary as she led the reigning European champions to another final in which they were defeated by Olympique Lyonnais. Nonetheless, Putellas finished as the competition’s top scorer with eleven goals in ten appearances, a remarkable achievement for a midfielder, scoring in the quarter-final, semi-final and final. She was also voted as the tournament’s Player of the Season by the UEFA Technical Committee.

Off the field, her impact was no less great. In March, Italian urban artist Tvboy created a mural of Putellas in Barcelona’s La Plaça d’En Joanic dressed as Superwoman. The same month, her image was displayed on the side of the biggest stadium in Europe, Camp Nou before the FC Barcelona women’s team played two Champions League matches there watched by world record crowds of over 91,000 – Putellas scored in both games. Later this year, Amazon Prime are set to release a three-part Spanish-language documentary series on her entitled ‘Alexia: Labor Omnia Vincit‘ (Work Overcomes Everything).

It seemed the stage was set for Putellas to shine on the international stage as well at this summer’s UEFA Women’s Euro in England. Spain went into the tournament unbeaten in over two years, with Putellas finishing as joint-top scorer at February’s warm-up tournament, the Arnold Clark Cup. In June she became the first woman from her country to make 100 international appearances.

However, Putellas’ hopes were dashed on the very eve of tournament as a training ground injury resulted in her rupturing the anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee. The subsequent operation and rehabilitation means Putellas will be out of the game for up to a year meaning she will miss the majority of the current season. For her to be once again voted the best women’s player in the world in spite of this is a testament to her majesty in the first half of 2022.

First presented in 1956 by magazine France Football to the best performing male player over the year, the Ballon D’Or was until 1995 only open to Europeans. Originally based on the votes of journalists, it is now also voted on by the coaches and captains of national teams and since 2007 has become a global prize.

The women’s version of the award, the Ballon D’Or Feminin is only in its fifth year, first won by Norwegian Ada Hegerberg in 2018, then Megan Rapinoe the following year. It was not awarded in 2020 due to the postponement of top level soccer throughout Europe due to the Covid pandemic. For the first time in 2022, the voting was based on a player’s performances over the previous season, from August 2021 to July 2022, instead of the calendar year.

Last year, Putellas was the overwhelming winner of the prize, accumulating more than double the points of Jenni Hermoso in second place. That was part of Putellas’ unprecedented clean sweep of every major individual award on offer in which she was also voted, the UEFA Women’s Player of the Year, The Best FIFA Women’s Player and the Women’s Player of 2021 by World Soccer Magazine and the International Federation of Football History & Statistics (IFFHS).

Considering that players representing FC Barcelona and Real Madrid have won the award 24 times, it is remarkable that Putellas became the first Spanish winner since another Barcelona player, Luis Suárez Miramontes in 1960. Real Madrid legend Alfredo Di Stéfano had previously won the award for Spain in 1957 and 1959. The Argentinian-born forward had become a Spanish citizen in 1956 in order to qualify to represent their national team and become eligible to win the award in the days when it was restricted to European players. Despite the Spanish flag by his name, most in the game look back on Di Stéfano as a South American, making Putellas, in most people’s eyes, the first from her country to win the Ballon D’Or twice.

By winning in successive years, Putellas also joins a stellar of players (all previously male) to have retained the Ballon D’Or award alongside Johan Cruyff, Kevin Keegan, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, Michel Platini (who retained it twice), Marco van Basten, Lionel Messi (who retained it four times) and Cristiano Ronaldo (who also retained it twice).