On September 22, the name of the 2025 ball will be unveiled during a ceremony organized at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris. A few weeks before this gala, France Football announced yesterday the names of the 30 players in the race to succeed Rodri (Manchester City, Spain), winner in 2024. Some players have already been dismissed at this stage. This is the case of several Paris Saint-Germain players, who is well represented with 9 nominated (Désiré Doué, Gianluigi Donnarumma, João Neves, Nuno Mendes, Fabian Ruiz, Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, Vitinha, Achraf Hakimi and Ousmane Dembélé.) Bradley Barcola, Marquinhos or Willian Pacho did not have this chance.
They are also among our list of forgotten on the Ballon d'Or 2025. Concerning the two defenders, Vincent Garcia, the editor -in -chief of France Footballexplained their absences in The team. “It is not a sanction, the two players had less than half of the votes on the part of the List Committee (…) Luis Figo, Fabio Capello and the Icelandic juror Vidir Sigurdsson chose more Marquinhos, where French journalists were more inclined to choose Pacho (…) If PSG had won the final, it would have been difficult not to make a Strike.” The voting division and their posts did not argue in their favor. But this decision does not pass. Especially concerning Pacho. With him, in Ecuador, we do not understand his absence from the list of 30 at all.
The absence of a pacho is talked about
Arrived last summer in the French capital, he won, he who participated in 57 games in all competitions (2 assists). Despite his impressive season, he did not collect enough votes for the BO. What the Ecuadorian press does not digest. L'Express writing : “The 2025 Golden Ball ceremony is already in full swing, causing both expectations and controversies. This Thursday, August 7, the list of 30 nominees for this prestigious award was unveiled, and the big surprise was the total absence of equatorial players. Primary personalities like Willian Pacho and Moisés Caicedo, who have experienced exceptional seasons respectively with PSG and Chelsea, were not taken into account by the organization. ”
The publication continues: “This omission has aroused a keen debate among the supporters, who wonder if the list of nominees really reflects the talent and the performance of football as a whole. The nominees come mainly from Europe, with only four representatives of South America: the Argentines Lautaro Martínez and Alexis Mac Allister, and the Brazilians Vinicius Jr. and Raphinha. ” Same bell sound for El Telegrafo :: “Unfortunately, to everyone's surprise, the Ecuadorian players Willian Pacho and Moisés Caicedo, author of beautiful seasons respectively at PSG and Chelsea, are not among the nominees. In reality, most of the nominees are European. ” Ecuadorian supporters and the media do not understand the absence of a Pacho, or even that of Mo Moist Caicedo. The latter notably won the Europa Conference League and the Club World Cup with Chelsea. On the other hand, nothing to report for the moment in Brazil concerning the absence of the Parisian captain Marquinhos among the 30s.
