Ballon d'Or of All Time award opens for fan voting

France Football has launched a paid online poll for fans to choose the greatest Ballon d'Or-winning season, with Cristiano Ronaldo currently leading the vote ahead of the 2026 ceremony.

France Football has launched a new fan-voted award, the Ballon d’Or of All Time, asking supporters to choose the greatest single-season performance in the award's history. The online poll, which costs €1 per vote, is currently being led by Cristiano Ronaldo and offers a chance to win tickets to the 2026 ceremony.

The award's official social media account confirmed Ronaldo's lead with a post stating, "CRISTIANO RONALDO IS LEADING 🇵🇹🏁". Voting is open until midnight on October 27th, with the results expected to be announced the following day. The main gala where the award will be presented is scheduled for next Monday, October 26th, at the London Palladium.

Eligibility and voting rules

To be eligible for this specific honour, a player must have won the Ballon d’Or at least twice in their career. The vote is not for a player's entire body of work, but for their best individual winning campaign from one specific year. Each fan vote requires a €1 fee, which also enters the participant into a draw for two tickets to the 2026 Ballon d’Or ceremony in Paris. France Football states the vote is a way to engage the global football community in a unique historical debate, isolating a player's absolute peak season from among the award's most decorated winners.

Historical context of the award

First awarded in 1956, the Ballon d’Or has been dominated in the modern era by Lionel Messi, who holds the record with eight wins. Cristiano Ronaldo follows with five victories. Other multiple winners in the poll's ten-player field include three-time champions Johan Cruyff, Michel Platini, and Marco van Basten. Legends like Alfredo Di Stéfano, Franz Beckenbauer, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, Kevin Keegan, and Ronaldo Nazário, each with two wins, are also eligible.

Historical eligibility rules, which until 1995 restricted the award to European players, mean iconic figures like Pelé and Diego Maradona are excluded from this particular vote. Similarly, one-time winners such as Zinedine Zidane, Eusébio, and Ronaldinho are not in the running. The focus is squarely on which player's peak season, among those who have won multiple times, stands above the rest as voted by the global football community. The magazine notes that the inaugural Ballon d'Or of All Time is a standalone fan engagement project, separate from the main annual award process.

For TS Galaxy FC supporters following world football, the next focus returns to domestic action with a trip to face Polokwane City on October 31st.