Some might question whether Lionel Messi really deserved to win his latest Ballon d'Or prize ahead of other worthy candidates, but the Argentinian has been rewarded for continuing to be so good for so long.
The most turbulent year of Messi's glittering career, in which he was forced to tearfully bid farewell to Barcelona, ends with him – at the age of 34 – claiming a record-extending seventh Ballon d'Or for the best player in the world.
In Germany they thought it had to be Robert Lewandowski's year after he missed out 12 months ago when the 2020 award was scrapped because of the pandemic.
Karim Benzema might have had plenty of support in Spain for his remarkable performances with Real Madrid, and Jorginho could stake a claim after a year in which he won the Champions League with Chelsea and Euro 2020 with Italy.
Yet it is the enduring brilliance of Messi, who won the last award in 2019, which stays in the minds of the jurors when it comes to voting.
Having joined Paris Saint-Germain in August, he is the first male player to win the award while with a French club since Jean-Pierre Papin of Marseille in 1991, although it was his achievements with Barcelona and with Argentina that counted towards him effectively retaining his crown.
Messi tried unsuccessfully to force his departure from Barcelona in August 2020, but he showed no signs of rancour as he stayed put at the Camp Nou and ended last season with 38 goals in 48 games for his boyhood club.
These are the kind of remarkable figures that he has made so mundane over the course of his career. He scored more goals than that in 10 of his previous 11 seasons.
Messi was the top scorer in La Liga for the fifth consecutive year with 30 goals and won the Copa del Rey, scoring twice in the final as Barcelona beat Athletic Bilbao 4-0.
This will always be remembered as the year his long association with the Catalan giants came to an end, after 672 goals in 778 appearances, a record goal tally for one club.
But 2021 was also the year he finally won a major international title, captaining Argentina to victory in the Copa America with a 1-0 win against Brazil in the final at the Maracana.
He scored four goals in the tournament as Argentina won the South American championship for the first time since 1993.
Yet the shame was that hardly any fans were in the stadium to witness that success due to coronavirus restrictions, only adding to the sense that, despite all he has achieved, Messi still has unfinished business.
Not least at PSG, where he has so far played just 11 games since arriving in August, and scored just four goals.
Messi did provide three assists for the Parisians in a Ligue 1 match on Sunday but it remains to be seen how motivated the Argentinian is by the French league. He has other priorities.
"My dream is to win another Champions League," he said at his unveiling in August, with the last of his four European Cups coming in 2015.
Then there is the really big one: the World Cup in Qatar will be underway this time next year and Messi will be 35 by then.
That will surely be his last chance to win the greatest trophy of all, and you imagine he would swap his seven Ballons d'Or to get his hands on it.
Ballon d'Or results
1- Lionel Messi (Paris St-Germain/Argentina, forward)
2 - Robert Lewandowski (Bayern Munich/Poland, forward)
3 - Jorginho (Chelsea/Italy, midfielder)
4 - Karim Benzema (Real Madrid/France, forward)
5 - N'Golo Kante (Chelsea/France, midfielder)
6 - Cristiano Ronaldo (Manchester United/Portugal, forward)
7 - Mohamed Salah (Liverpool/Egypt, forward)
8 - Kevin de Bruyne (Manchester City/Belgium, midfielder)
9 - Kylian Mbappe (Paris St-Germain/France, forward)
10 - Gianluigi Donnarumma (Paris St-Germain/Italy, goalkeeper)
11 - Erling Braut Haaland (Borussia Dortmund/Norway, forward)
12 - Romelu Lukaku (Chelsea/Belgium, forward)
13 - Giorgio Chiellini (Juventus/Italy, defender)
14 - Leonardo Bonucci (Juventus/Italy, defender)
15 - Raheem Sterling (Manchester City/England, forward)
16 - Neymar (Paris St-Germain/Brazil, forward)
17 - Luis Suarez (Atletico Madrid/Uruguay, forward)
18 - Simon Kjaer (AC Milan/Denmark, defender)
19 - Mason Mount (Chelsea/England, midfielder)
20 - Riyad Mahrez (Manchester City/Algeria, forward)
21 - Bruno Fernandes (Manchester United/Portugal, midfielder), tied with Lautauro Martinez (Inter Milan/Argentina, forward)
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23 - Harry Kane (Tottenham/England, forward)
24 - Pedri (Barcelona/Spain, midfielder)
25 - Phil Foden (Manchester City/England, forward)
26 - Nicolo Barella (Inter Milan/Italy, midfielder), tied with Ruben Dias (Manchester City/Portugal, defender) and Gerard Moreno (Villarreal/Spain, forward)
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29 - Luka Modric (Real Madrid/Croatia, midfielder), tied with Cesar Azpilicueta (Chelsea/Spain, defender)
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Countdown to Zero exhibition will show how disease can be beaten
Countdown to Zero: Defeating Disease, an international multimedia exhibition created by the American Museum of National History in collaboration with The Carter Center, will open in Abu Dhabi a month before Reaching the Last Mile.
Opening on October 15 and running until November 15, the free exhibition opens at The Galleria mall on Al Maryah Island, and has already been seen at the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum in Atlanta, the American Museum of Natural History in New York, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
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Analysis
Members of Syria's Alawite minority community face threat in their heartland after one of the deadliest days in country’s recent history. Read more
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Specs – Taycan 4S
Engine: Electric
Transmission: 2-speed auto
Power: 571bhp
Torque: 650Nm
Price: Dh431,800
Specs – Panamera
Engine: 3-litre V6 with 100kW electric motor
Transmission: 2-speed auto
Power: 455bhp
Torque: 700Nm
Price: from Dh431,800
Jetour T1 specs
Engine: 2-litre turbocharged
Power: 254hp
Torque: 390Nm
Price: From Dh126,000
Available: Now
More on Quran memorisation:
GAC GS8 Specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4cyl turbo
Power: 248hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 400Nm at 1,750-4,000rpm
Transmission: 8-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 9.1L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh149,900
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The years Ramadan fell in May
The burning issue
The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE.
Read part four: an affection for classic cars lives on
Read part three: the age of the electric vehicle begins
Read part one: how cars came to the UAE
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
The specs
Engine: 4.0-litre V8 twin-turbocharged and three electric motors
Power: Combined output 920hp
Torque: 730Nm at 4,000-7,000rpm
Transmission: 8-speed dual-clutch automatic
Fuel consumption: 11.2L/100km
On sale: Now, deliveries expected later in 2025
Price: expected to start at Dh1,432,000
EPL's youngest
- Ethan Nwaneri (Arsenal)
15 years, 181 days old
- Max Dowman (Arsenal)
15 years, 235 days old
- Jeremy Monga (Leicester)
15 years, 271 days old
- Harvey Elliott (Fulham)
16 years, 30 days old
- Matthew Briggs (Fulham)
16 years, 68 days old
Uefa Nations League: How it works
The Uefa Nations League, introduced last year, has reached its final stage, to be played over five days in northern Portugal. The format of its closing tournament is compact, spread over two semi-finals, with the first, Portugal versus Switzerland in Porto on Wednesday evening, and the second, England against the Netherlands, in Guimaraes, on Thursday.
The winners of each semi will then meet at Porto’s Dragao stadium on Sunday, with the losing semi-finalists contesting a third-place play-off in Guimaraes earlier that day.
Qualifying for the final stage was via League A of the inaugural Nations League, in which the top 12 European countries according to Uefa's co-efficient seeding system were divided into four groups, the teams playing each other twice between September and November. Portugal, who finished above Italy and Poland, successfully bid to host the finals.
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
