Lionel Messi winning Ballon d’Or thanks to flawed voting process that cost Kylian Mbappe and Erling Haaland top gong

THEY will hand the Ballon d’Or to the world’s best player in a glittering awards ceremony in Paris on Monday.

But Cristiano Ronaldo is unable to attend because he’s busy washing his hair.

GettyWorld Cup winner Lionel Messi is set to win his eighth Ballon d’Or[/caption]

APMessi now plays for Inter Miami in MLS[/caption]

The self-proclaimed GOAT ruled himself out of the running for football’s ultimate individual award when he flounced off to the desert at the start of the year.

Because it seems that finishing runner-up in the Saudi Pro League is not quite enough to convince his fan boys to keep casting their votes in his favour.

So now the trophy will be presented to the guy whose current team is next to bottom of the MLS (Eastern Conference).

And poor old Cristiano will have a face like a slapped arse when arch-nemesis Lionel Messi displays his golden ball for a record eighth time.

Not that he has officially been confirmed as King Leo the 8th just yet.

But let’s not kid ourselves that anyone else is in with a shout after the news of Messi’s impending coronation was leaked this week.

The deal was sealed the moment he slipped on that negligee to lift the World Cup in Qatar last December.

And you have to ask what more Erling Haaland could possibly have done to win first prize after the season he had for Manchester City.

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The Norwegian phenomenon scored an unbelievable 52 goals to help City win a Champions League, Premier League and FA Cup Treble.

Yes, Messi won the French league with Paris Saint-Germain despite supporters demanding he be sacked for an unauthorised mid-season commercial trip to Saudi.

But he’s not getting the Ballon d’Or for coming first in a one-horse race.

He’s getting it on the back of six games for Argentina — presumably they’re not including the defeat by Saudi Arabia in their opening World Cup group match.

Four of his seven tournament goals were scored from the penalty spot and you could argue that he wasn’t even the best player in Qatar.

That was Kylian Mbappe, who scored a hat-trick in the final and was the tournament’s top scorer, yet is 66-1 to be named World Player of the Year in his home city next week.

At least Messi’s coronation will be the first time in 15 years that the award hasn’t gone to a player from Real Madrid or Barcelona.

So maybe we should be grateful for small mercies.

But it is obvious that the entire voting process is flawed when the judges are so much in thrall to two clubs from the same country.

The great irony is that it is 63 years since Luis Suarez became the one and only Spanish-born winner of the award.

No wonder Jude Bellingham was so keen to move to Madrid this year. He knows it’s the only way he will receive the universal recognition his brilliance deserves.

Only four Englishmen (Stanley Matthews, Bobby Charlton, Kevin Keegan and Michael Owen) have ever won the Ballon d’Or in its 67-year history.

And the last player to win it while playing for an English club was (surprise, surprise) Ronaldo when he was still at Manchester United back in 2008.

Maybe Haaland can change all that by scoring 100 goals for City this season and winning the Premier League, Champions League, FA Cup,Carabao Cup, European Super Cup and Club World Cup.

He’d just better pray that Inter Miami don’t make the MLS play-offs.

EYES OFF THE BALL

EMMA RADUCANU claims it is because they can’t cope with her “provoking and challenging” questions that she has got through more coaches than ­National Express.

It’s nearly two years since she won the US Open against all the odds — and she has hardly won a match since.

GettyEmma Raducanu claims her ‘provoking’ questions have led to her turnover of coaches[/caption]

She hasn’t played since undergoing wrist and ankle surgery in May and is currently 283rd in the WTA rankings.

But at least she still has her lucrative commercial contracts with Nike, ­Porsche, Dior, Vodafone, Tiffany and ­Wilson.

So maybe her next ­“provoking” question will be “why do I need to bother with tennis?”

CAUGHT OUT

PATHETIC. There is no other word to describe England’s Cricket World Cup campaign following yesterday’s eight-wicket humiliation by Sri Lanka.

Jos Buttler and his team of losers have now been hammered in four of their five matches and have still to play India, Australia, Holland and Pakistan.

GettyEngland have had a disappointing Cricket World Cup run[/caption]

But, hey, at least we managed to beat the mighty Bangladesh, so it’s not all bad news.

Captain Buttler will carry the can but he is by no means the only big name who has gone missing during the past three weeks.

Joe Root, Jonny Bairstow, Ben Stokes, Mark Wood, Chris Woakes, Sam Curran and Moeen Ali have also failed to live up to their reputations as world-class players.

Can’t bat, can’t bowl and can’t field, England are a team of complete all-rounders.

EVER SO UNFAIR

THE Premier League are demanding a 12-point deduction if Everton are found guilty of breaking Financial Fair Play rules.

But no word yet on the proposed punishment for Manchester City, charged with 115 offences dating all the way back to 2009.

Everton could face a points deductionGetty

They haven’t even begun disciplinary proceedings against the serial champions because they’re being tied up in knots by City’s army of lawyers.

And what about Chelsea, who spent more money in the past year than Everton have blown throughout Farhad Moshiri’s disastrous seven-year reign?

I’m all for punishing clubs who break rules but there seems to be one law for the Big Six and another for the rest.

ROCKETS BOOSTER

PETROLHEADS finally had something to get excited about last weekend when Lewis Hamilton gave Max Verstappen his first proper race of the season at the US Grand Prix.

However, their relief proved to be short-lived when Hamilton was disqualified because the floor of his car was ruled to be ‘too thin’.

ReutersLewis Hamilton was disqualified from the US GP due to a fault with his car[/caption]

After watching Red Bull turn the dullest championship in history into a procession, you would have thought the authorities would welcome any kind of challenge to Verstappen’s utter dominance.

Even if that meant the rest of the field driving rockets.

WEBB OF INTRIGUE

WHEN Darren England and his VAR assistant Dan Cook incorrectly ruled out a Liverpool goal at Spurs, they were immediately removed from duty by refs’ chief Howard Webb.

But there was no such sanction for Michael Oliver, despite Webb admitting the ref was wrong not to send off Manchester City’s Mateo Kovacic against Arsenal.

So, it seems that some referees are more important than others.