Chapter 853 The Best Player in Europe

UEFA's annual European Player of the Year award is somewhat intended to compete with FIFA's Ballon d'Or.

After the FIFA World Player of the Year award was merged with the French team's European Ballon d'Or, Europe was almost blank in terms of player selection, so it was natural for UEFA to launch the European Best Player Award at the right time.

However, this seems to be a bit of an eye-opener for FIFA.

But, in the final analysis, FIFA should have gotten used to this troublemaker a long time ago.

In order to distinguish it from FIFA's Ballon d'Or, the selection process for the European Best Player Award is divided into two rounds.

In the first round of voting, football journalists from the 54 member countries each submitted a list of three players, and the three players with the highest scores were selected to enter the second round of voting.

This year, the highest scorer was Ibrahimovic, followed by Cristiano Ronaldo and finally Neuer.

At this point, Yang Huan had to sigh and say that the goalkeeper was at a disadvantage.

Otherwise, based on Neuer's status as the main goalkeeper of the World Championship and the main goalkeeper of the European Champions League, these two titles would be enough to qualify him for the title of Europe's best player.

It is also a pity for Toni Kroos, who also deserved the opportunity to win this award.

Unlike FIFA's Ballon d'Or, the second round of voting for the Best European Player will be conducted through on-site electronic voting, with journalists who participated in the first round of voting selecting one of the three people.

As for who it will be, no one can say for sure before the vote.

This is also the biggest suspense in the selection of the best player in Europe.

Because of the live broadcast, UEFA specially scheduled the voting to be held after the draw ceremony.

This made Yang Huan feel like yelling.

During the draw, the first thing to be announced was the ranking of the 32 teams.

As the new champion of the Champions League, Southampton entered the top seeded team in the group stage.

Interestingly, Atletico Madrid and Benfica are also first-tier teams.

This was not really because of Yang Huan’s actions, but because their points were enough.

Basel of Switzerland entered the second pot, Ajax entered the third pot, while Monaco, which returned to the Champions League after many years, Anderlecht of Belgium, and Sparta Prague, which eliminated their opponents in the qualifiers, entered the fourth pot.

The ranking is mainly based on European competition points, so there is no room for any tricks.

But there is a saying that is very true: a good classification is not as good as a good lottery.

When Southampton was divided into groups, they were placed in Group G. As a result, when they drew lots, they drew Schalke 04 of the Bundesliga in the second tier, Sporting Lisbon in the third tier, and Maribor of Slovenia in the fourth tier. Their luck in the draw was pretty good.

In fact, when it comes to drawing lots, there is a detail that is not often noticed.

Many people like to say there is some trickery involved, and there may be some truth to that, but in reality, there really aren’t many options for drawing lots.

Just like Southampton, as a Premier League team, they couldn't be drawn by Manchester City in the second tier or Liverpool in the third tier.

If the second-tier team is drawn to be Schalke 04 of the Bundesliga, then Leverkusen of the third-tier will not be drawn.

As for the fourth tier, among the eight teams, the ones that are truly stronger are Monaco and Roma.

But you can imagine how high the probability is when choosing two out of eight.

Atletico Madrid was also lucky as it was placed in Group A, where its opponents were Juventus, Olympiacos and Malmö.

Basel was unlucky. Although they were a team in the second group, they met Real Madrid and Liverpool in the third tier.

On the contrary, Monaco, which is in the fourth tier, had incredible luck, as it drew Porto, Zenit St. Petersburg and Leverkusen. This should be considered the luckiest team among the fourth tier teams.

As for Benfica, they drew with Shakhtar Donetsk, Athletic Bilbao and Borisov, all of which are strong.

Ajax was unlucky enough to be placed in the same group as Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain, and had to strive for third place in the league almost from the start.

Looking at the eight groups, if there is any unlucky team, the most unlucky one must be Bayern Munich.

As a seeded team, Bayern Munich drew Manchester City in the second pot, CSKA Moscow in the third pot, and Roma of Serie A in the fourth pot. All four teams are very strong and it can be called the group of death.

As soon as the draw results were announced, there was an uproar at the scene and everyone started talking about it.

It is completely predictable that all the newspapers will be publishing it tomorrow, and it will definitely be another conspiracy theory.

"Manchester City is really unlucky!"

After seeing the results of the draw, Peter Kenyon shook his head and smiled bitterly.

Who says it’s not?

Yang Huan also smiled and said, "In the Champions League group stage last season, Manchester City also faced Bayern Munich and CSKA Moscow. As a result, Manchester City broke through and advanced from the group stage."

At this point, Yang Huan laughed, "If we follow the conspiracy theory, it should be that UEFA saw that Manchester City was invincible last season, so this season it has intensified its efforts. In addition to Bayern Munich and CSKA, there is also Roma. I don’t believe that they can’t defeat Manchester City!"

Peter Kenyon also laughed out loud. What Master Huan said really had a paparazzi vibe to it.

But when you think about it, it makes sense that such a bizarre draw result is indeed easy to arouse people's imagination.

"It is a bit difficult, but with Manchester City's strength, it should be no problem to get through the group stage."

As a strong team in the Premier League, Manchester City is indeed strong enough and has a strong lineup. If they fail to qualify from the group, Pellegrini will probably have to be sacked.

Yang Huan nodded, "Roma and CSKA Moscow can't stop Manchester City. The key question is whether they are first or second in the group. This will determine how far Manchester City can go."

Peter Kenyon supports this view.

Although there may not be much difference between the first and second place in the group, in fact, there is a huge difference.

According to the current rules, the second place in each group will meet the first place in other groups in the round of 16.

Then take a look at which teams are the first in each group?

Real Madrid, Barcelona, ​​Southampton, Bayern Munich...

Not to mention Manchester City, who can have the confidence to win against these teams?

Therefore, in Yang Huan's opinion, Manchester City's current problem lies not in the team's competitiveness in the knockout stage, but in its ability to score points in the group stage.

"However, it's unlucky to say that Manchester City seems to have encountered strong teams in the group stage in recent years." Yang Huan laughed with a bit of gloating.

From Real Madrid in the past to Bayern Munich today, Manchester City has encountered many rivals in the group stage.

Peter Kenyon also smiled slightly, "In fact, the main reason is that Manchester City lacks experience in European competitions."

"Yes, if they accumulate points in the Europa League for one or two years and enter the Champions League, they will naturally not always be ranked third or fourth, and the group stage draw will be much easier."

Theoretically speaking, players in the third and fourth tiers will definitely encounter strong opponents, it’s just a matter of strength.

On the other hand, Southampton had successfully defended the Europa League for two seasons and earned enough points in European competitions, which gave them a certain advantage when it came to the division. They even won the Champions League last season, so they naturally avoided other giants.

After the Champions League group stage draw ceremony, the award ceremony continued.

Platini walked up to the podium with a smile, holding the voting results from the reporters.

The UEFA president is always good at seizing every opportunity to appear in public. Perhaps this is the first element that an excellent candidate must possess.

"I just got the results of the vote for the best player in Europe by all the journalists present."

When everyone heard Platini say this, their hearts suddenly tightened.

Yang Huan also looked solemn. He was very concerned about who would win this award.

"The result is in my hands!" Platini smiled and raised the answer in his hand. This almost made many people at the scene burst into tears. Damn it, can you stop wasting time and be direct, okay?

Perhaps it was the protests from many people in the audience, or perhaps Platini himself had a change of heart and decided not to drag it out any longer. Anyway, he quickly flipped through the results in his hand and shouted into the microphone with a smile, "The winner of the European Player of the Year for the 2013-2014 season is..."

Everyone below held their breath, waiting to hear the final answer.

"...from Southampton..."

When Yang Huan heard this, his heart skipped a beat. Isn’t it Cristiano Ronaldo?

From Southampton, could it be Neuer?

Looking over again, the German goalkeeper is also very excited. He must have thought it was him.

But the shameless UEFA president on the stage changed the subject, "...Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who currently plays for Paris Saint-Germain!"

After he finished speaking, he burst into laughter and said, "Let's congratulate Zlatan for winning the best player in Europe!"

The whole audience was in an uproar.

Immediately afterwards, there was a burst of thunderous applause.

Almost everyone stood up and applauded Ibrahimovic.

Ibrahimovic, who was sitting in the Paris Saint-Germain area, also stood up and hugged the Paris Saint-Germain management and teammates around him to accept their congratulations.

Afterwards, when he left the area and was about to go to the stage, he ran to the Southampton side, took the initiative to hug Neuer and other Saints teammates, and finally came to Yang Huan.

"Thank you, Master Huan!" Ibrahimovic gave Yang Huan a big hug.

"No, no!" Yang Huan was a little tired.

Damn it, can you please not be so rough?

Ibrahimovic ran up to the podium with a smile on his face, took the trophy from Platini's hands, looked at it for a while, and then walked to the microphone.

"Here, I must thank all my friends who supported and voted for me, thank my family, thank my agent, and thank everyone who has helped me, but the one I want to thank most is Southampton and Master Huan!"

There was another round of thunderous applause at the scene.

Ibrahimovic has always given people the impression of being cold and arrogant, and he often has conflicts with his old clubs, including Ajax, Juventus and Barcelona. But now, he took the initiative to thank Southampton, which is really not easy.

This shows that he has really matured.

"I still remember that four years ago, I was at the lowest point in my career. I barely had any football to play. It was Master Huan who found me and told me to come to Saints and we could make a career together."

At this point, Ibrahimovic showed a nostalgic smile on his face.

"I didn't believe it at first. You know, this kind of trick can only fool children!"

Everyone was stunned at once. They didn't expect that this guy had such a sense of humor.

"But later, I believed it!"

"When I decided to join Southampton, I told myself that it was a gamble with my life. I believed in Master Huan, believed in the Saints, and believed that we could create brilliance together."

“Four years later, I’m standing here and I’m so proud because I did it!”

“I am also very proud that I chose the Saints!”

At this point, Ibrahimovic suddenly pointed at Yang Huan and said with a smile: "Master Huan, I am where I am today thanks to you. I sincerely hope that my career can end with the Saints, because you said, once a saint, always a saint!"

Having said that, Ibrahimovic slowly took two steps back and bowed deeply to the audience below.

There was thunderous applause at the scene, and many people were even infected by this scene.