A few hours before the handover ceremony begins Ballon d’Or by the magazine France Footballan unexpected event happened. It is that in the midst of rumors and leaked lists that give a supposed winner, the Real Madrid made the decision that its delegation will be absent from the gala. Although in the run-up the top favorite to win the trophy was Vinicius Júnior, everything seems to indicate that Rodri Hernández will win it.
For a few weeks now, the main candidate to be recognized as the best footballer of the 2023/24 season by the French magazine was the Brazilian striker from Real Madrid. However, this morning some images began to circulate detailing the top positions in the male branch. They keep the Manchester City midfielder in first place with several points of advantage.
Given this last minute news, the Spanish giant decided to hit the table and will not travel to France. Vinicius Jr., Kylian Mbappe, Jude Bellingham, Dani Carvajal and Thibaut Courtoiswho is the favorite for the Yashin Trophy, They will not be at the ceremony. For his part, Carlo Ancelotti and the entire Merengue board headed by Florentino Perez They will not say they are present in Parisian territory either.
At the Adolfo Suárez de Barajas airport, on the outskirts of the Spanish capital, there was the plane booked by Real Madrid that was going to take him to Paris to be present at the trophy presentation. However, this last-minute decision only increases the credibility of the list that went viral where it names Rodri Hernández as the winner of the award.
The delegation of the Madrid team consisted of 50 people, including footballers, the coach, managers and family members of the players. The first alarm signals were given in the Ciudad Deportiva, where the scheduled departures did not take place. Then, the news was confirmed at the Barajas airport by not receiving the Real Madrid staff due to the sudden suspension of the flight.
The information that both Real Madrid and Vinicius Júnior had was that the Brazilian was going to be the winner of the 2024 Ballon d’Or. In the last few hours the situation began to go wrong and the lists that were made public ended up shaking the Spanish team. The shock was so great that it led Florentino Pérez to make the drastic decision to be absent from the ceremony.
Starting this year, UEFA began to be part of the organization of the France Football event that determines who was the best footballer of the season. For this reason, Real Madrid believe that they were harmed in the final decision. Within the Madrid club they believed that if it were not the Brazilian, the winner should be Dani Carvajal.