Messi, De Jong and Hansen, nominated for ‘The Best’ awards

Lionel Messi, Frenkie de Jong and Caroline Graham Hansen have been chosen by FIFA as being the 10 best players on the planet. The three Barça players are all candidates for 'The Best 2019' award, the winner of which will be announced in Milan on 23 September. 

Since the creation of the award in 2016,  Messi has been amongst the 10 nominees on three successive occasions. If we take a look at the award in it's previous guises - the FIFA Ballon d'Or and the FIFA World Player award - then the Argentine is on the list of 10 for the 13th season in a row. In all those years he has ended up winning the award on five occasions. 

For his part, Frenkie de Jong is on the list for the first time in his career after a great season with Ajax. The two Barça players will be competing against strong opposition with the other names on the 10 man list being Cristiano Ronaldo, Matthijs De Ligt, Eden Hazard, Harry Kane, Sadio Mané, Kylian Mbappé, Mohammed Salah and Virgil Van Dijk.

Caroline Graham Hansen, signed this summer from Wolfsburg, also has the chance to claim the women's edition of the award. The Norwegian is up against Lucy Bronze, Julie Ertz, Ada Hegerberg, Amandine Henry, Sam Kerr, Rose Lavelle, Vivianne Miedema, Alex Morgan, Megan Rapinoe, Wendie Renard and Elen White.