Barcelona and Real Madrid reign in Europe and monopolize the nominations for the Golden Ball

FIFA and the magazine France Football announced Tuesday the names of 23 candidates for the 'FIFA Ballon d'Or' , among which the presence of eight players from FC Barcelona Real Madrid and five.

Thus, the Barca team, as well as Lionel Messi, who won recognition in 2009 and 2010 , is represented by Gerard Pique, Eric Abidal, Dani Alves, Cesc Fabregas, Andres Iniesta, Xavi Hernández and David Villa, while Real Madrid has Iker Casillas, Cristiano Ronaldo, winner in 2008, Mesut Ozil, Xabi Alonso and Karim Benzema.

Next to them, among the ten candidates highlights the presence of two exfutbolistas Atletico Madrid, the duo of striker Sergio 'Kun' Agüero (Argentina), Diego Forlan (Uruguay ), who left the team last summer destination to Manchester City and Inter Milan respectively.

In addition, also include the Inter player, the Dutch Wesley Sneijder , and his former teammate and now the Russian Anzi, Cameroon's Samuel Eto'o and Brazilian Neymar , the new global pearl Santos.

The ratio of the closed shortlisted Bayern Munich German Thomas Mueller and Bastian Schweinsteiger, the players of Manchester United Nani and Wayne Rooney and Liverpool's Uruguayan striker Luis Suárez.

By countries, Spain has seven representatives, the champions of Europe and the world Casillas, Pique, unstable, Xavi, Xabi Alonso, Cesc and Villa, three Germans, Mesut Ozil, Thomas Muller and Bastian Schweinsteiger. Two representatives are Argentina, Brazil, France, Portugal and Uruguay, one of Cameroon, England and Holland.

So will the vote

Soccer experts Football Committee, the Technical and Development Committee and a group of experts 'France Football', have developed lists of shortlisted candidates and vote for electing a new champion will take her out the coaches and national captains, as well as international media representatives chosen by the magazine.

On December 5, 2011, FIFA and France Football announced in Paris, the names of the three final candidates and the winner will be announced in the second gala of the Golden Ball Cup ', which will take place on 9 January 2012 from the Kongresshaus in Zurich.

It also awarded prizes to the best player, coach, 'FIFA FIFPro World XI Award', the 'Puskas Award', the most spectacular goal of the year, as well as the 'Presidential Award' and 'Fair Play Award' .

List of candidates for the 2011 Golden Ball

Éric Abidal (France), Sergio Aguero (Argentina), Karim Benzema (France), Iker Casillas (Spain), Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal), Dani Alves (Brazil), Samuel Eto'o (Cameroon), Cesc Fabregas (Spain), Diego Forlan (Uruguay), Andres Iniesta (Spain), Lionel Messi (Argentina), Thomas Müller (Germany), Nani (Portugal), Neymar (Brazil), Mesut Ozil (Germany), Gerard Piqué (Spain), Wayne Rooney (England ), Bastian Schweinsteiger (Germany), Wesley Sneijder (Netherlands), Luis Suárez (Uruguay), David Villa (Spain), Xabi Alonso (Spain), Xavi (Spain).