By Mauricio Alencar
Fifa’s The Best Awards 2023 are returning to London this Monday evening, with Manchester City’s Erling Haaland and World Cup star Aitana Bonmati in contention for top prizes.
Other candidates for awards include Pep Guardiola, who is in the running for the best men’s coach award, and Emma Hayes, who is hoping to win the best women’s coach prize.
Fifa holds an event every year for the best men’s and women’s players and coaches. Other prizes are awarded for the best goal in the Puskas Award, as well as to an individual or group recognised for “exemplary fair play behaviour”.
The qualifying period for men’s awards was between 19 December 2022 and 20 August 2023, whereas women’s categories considered performances between 1 August 2022 and 20 August 2023. This means the men’s World Cup will be excluded from considerations for awards, but the women’s World Cup will be included in women’s prizes.
Lionel Messi won last year’s men’s player award following his long-awaited World Cup win. Alexia Putellas and Sarina Wiegman won the awards in the women’s categories for respective best player and best coach.
Previous winners in the fair play category include Denmark’s national team and staff members who acted to treat Christian Eriksen’s cardiac arrest at Euro 2020.
When are Fifa’s The Best awards?
The event will take place from 7:30pm on Monday 15 January. It is being held this year at the Hammersmith Apollo in West London.
How can I watch The Best awards?
The event will be free to stream on Fifa+ and on the Fifa website.
What are the award categories?
The official award categories are:
- The Best FIFA Women’s Player
- The Best FIFA Men’s Player
- The Best FIFA Women’s Coach
- The Best FIFA Men’s Coach
- The Best FIFA Women’s Goalkeeper
- The Best FIFA Men’s Goalkeeper
- FIFA Puskás Award (awarded for the best goal of the year)
- FIFA Fan Award
- FIFA Fair Play Award
- FIFA FIFPRO Women’s World 11
- FIFA FIFPRO Men’s World 11
Who is in the running for the big prizes?
Erling Haaland and Kylian Mbappe are the main frontrunners for the best men’s player. Lionel Messi, who has won the award seven times, is the third footballer in the shortlist.
Women’s World Cup winners Aitana Bonmati and Jennifer Hermoso will fight for the woemn’s prize, while Colombia’s Linda Caicedo completes the group of award finalists.
Chelsea’s Emma Hayes, Lionesses manager Sarina Wiegman and Barcelona’s Jonatan Giraldez are the three finalists in the best women’s coach category.
Manchester City’s Pep Guardiola, Inter Milan’s Simone Inzaghi and former Napoli manager Luciano Spalletti are the finalists in the men’s category.
Who votes for the winners?
There are four separate ways of voting for prizes. Each method is given equal weighting in pointing systems.
Shortlists were first drawn up by expert panels of former football icons including Kaká, Petr Cech and Mia Hamm.
After the release of shortlists, fans, specialist journalists and national team captains and coaches were able to select their chosen winners.
Fifa recorded over 1m fan votes.
What is the difference between The Best awards and the Ballon D’Or?
The Best awards are not the same as the Ballon D’Or.
Fifa’s The Best awards includes fans, journalists, coaches and footballers in its juries whereas an editorial team at the magazine France Football exclusively chooses the Ballon D’Or winner.
The two awards also decide winners according to different time periods.
Lionel Messi won the 2023 Ballon D’Or in October last year.
Fifa joined forces with France Football in 2010. The partnership ended in 2016 when each of the bodies awarded separate prizes.
The Ballon D’Or was first awarded in 1956 while The Best awards were introduced following the end of their deal with France Football.
Fifa used to hand out ‘World Player of the Year’ awards in between 1991 and 2010.
