He is one (or even the) of the major absentees from the list of 30 nominees for the 2026 Ballon d’Or, unveiled this Wednesday by France Footballwhich co-manages the most prestigious individual trophies with UEFA. To almost everyone’s surprise, Désiré Doué, like Bradley Barcola, was not selected. Enough to cause a huge reaction, especially the Parisian supporters.
To explain this surprising absence in view of the good season of number 14 of PSG, Vincent Garcia, the editor-in-chief of
France Footballput forward several arguments in the newspaper The Team this Thursday morning. “Exit Désiré Doué who often shared the light and statistics with Bradley Barcola. Their status as interchangeable, both at club and with the Blues, and their lack of regularity over the whole of a season where good periods followed one another and spells on the bench, did not help their individual results.he explained, and added: “ Everyone sent their list of nominees in each category. And then we had to count and then meet after the World Cup final to decide, because there are inevitably debates when a player approaches the red zone of 50% of the votes. »
In the show L’Equipe de Greg, Olivier Bossard, journalist from France Footballalso clarified: “Barcola had very few votes, while Désiré Doué it was almost 50-50. Désiré Doué finishes 31st or 32nd in this list, he is just behind. Until the end some tried to get him in (within 30). But those who did not bring him in ultimately felt that the competition had worked against him, particularly the competition with Barcola. Sometimes it was Barcola, sometimes it was him. In the French team, we had the impression that Doué was starting in front, but finally at the last moment Barcola was better and more used by Deschamps (…) You have to be striking to be in this list and we felt that he had been less so than the season before and that he had had a little difficulty digesting. »
“Should we see a link with the fact that the player (Doué) refused 3-4 interviews with France Football? »
A speech called into question by the Parisian insider, Djamel, often well informed about the capital club. “Désiré Doué absent from the Top 30 at the Ballon d’Or, despite his new good season… Should we see a link with the fact that the player refused 3-4 interviews with France Football? »he asked about X. To which the journalist from The TeamLoïc Tanzi replied: “Explanation impossible. Those who vote for the list of 30 are not exclusively France Football journalists. There are even Fabio Capello and Luis Figo among the voters. »
Still not convinced, Djamel then said:
“Possible explanation, because as mentioned on your channel, Désiré Doué was the subject of a last minute arbitration when making the list, so his non-presence is debatable. Also, apart from the 2 names you mentioned, it seems to me that all the other voters are part of the L’Équipe or France Football group, right? So even if these 2 names had voted for Désiré Doué, he would not have had the majority. »
