The 70th edition of the Ballon d’Or is arriving in a few short weeks. While waiting for the big evening planned for October 26 in London, the list of thirty nominees will be revealed in its entirety this Tuesday. This deadline is also an opportunity for some to look back on the previous winners and to regret that several big names were never able to lift the trophy.
For Giovanni Castaldi, it is the absence of Thierry Henry from the Ballon d’Or winners which is the cruelest. The columnist for the L’Équipe channel raised the subject on Monday. “Seeing a player we admired receive this trophy is something fantastic. (…) Me, Thierry Henry, I can’t digest it, I don’t understand how this guy, the more we see images again, didn’t get the Ballon d’Or. »
And Benjamin Castaldi’s half-brother continues, talking about the year when the former Arsenal striker should have been crowned, according to him. “It was in 2003, when (Pavel) Nedved has it. (…) In France, we like not to like our idols too much. Thierry Henry is someone we didn’t love as we should have loved him. »
Thierry Henry, the 2006 Ballon d’Or within reach
In addition to this second place obtained in 2003, Thierry Henry narrowly failed for the second time in this race for the individual trophy. It was three years later, during a season punctuated by the 2006 World Cup during which Raymond Domenech’s French team, led in particular by Zinédine Zidane at the top of his art, reached the final before losing on penalties to Italy.
A few weeks earlier, Thierry Henry had already failed to win a title, at the time of the Champions League final lost by his Arsenal team against FC Barcelona. Twenty years later, we await the name of the new Ballon d’Or who will succeed Ousmane Dembélé.
