The experts have been consulted, the contenders have been discussed, and the arguments have been had (several times over). Now it's here - FourFourTwo's eighth annual countdown of the world's 100 best football players.
Below are numbers 10-1, including Messi, Ronaldo, and a decision that's bound to get you talking...
Words: Matt Allen, Joe Brewin, Gregg Davies, Huw Davies, Jonathan Fadugba, Nick Harper, Louis Massarella, James Maw, Nick Moore and Gary Parkinson.
A big leap for the flying Dutchman this year – some achievement given 2013 was the year he scored the winner in the Champions League final. That was at the end of an injury-hit campaign, though, whereas Robben managed to stay off the treatment table for most of 2013/14 and into this season, with stellar performances for club and country featuring goals and assists galore. He’s one of few players in the world with PlayStation-esque pace and dribbling ability, demonstrated perfectly with his second goal in the 5-0 drubbing of Spain at the World Cup. Clearly at the peak of his powers, he's now 30, looks 40 and plays like he's 20. LM
VIDEOBeat your man like Arjen Robben
A flying start to his Manchester United career, a decent end to his Real Madrid one (man of the match in the Champions League final) and a very impressive World Cup in between have seen everyone’s favourite Noodle jump into our top 10. Not considered sexy enough for the Bernabeu’s marketing men, he already looks like being Old Trafford’s next great No.7 – a direct, left-footed winger or midfielder who provides, goals, assists and a tremendous work-rate. We heart you too, Angel. LM
FEATUREHow Di Maria overcame the boo boys
INTERVIEWDi Maria on the art of wing play
No Ballon d’Or, since FIFA added moral decency to the criteria without telling anybody, but Suarez makes our top 10 after an extraordinary 2014. Last year his No.19 placing was controversial, but then his individual brilliance often came at the expense of his team: in 2012/13 he attempted eight dribbles per game, and lost the ball more often than not. Now he’s less selfish, contributing 12 league assists last term and four in his first four Barça games – two from the bench against Almeria, turning a 1-0 deficit into a 2-1 win – as he accepts third billing to Lionel Messi and Neymar. And if Suarez took Liverpool’s penalties, he’d have scored 40 Premier League goals last season. Irreplaceable. HD
FEATURE How Suarez can revitalise Messi
VIDEOFinish like Luis Suarez
The man who first came to the Premier League’s collective consciousness in the first leg of last season’s Champions League semi-final, playing for Atletico Madrid and engaging in a spot of mild handbagging with his future captain, John Terry. As Costa made to move forwards, JT’s muscular shoulder slowed his progress. Irresistible force, immovable object. Costa wouldn’t back down and JT had more than met his match. His eyes lit up at the prospect of a physical battle, and now we know why. Built like the proverbial al fresco water closet, the Brazilian-Spanish bruiser will run through walls (and goalposts) in his pursuit of a goal. Quick of mind and, surprisingly, of feet, Costa is perhaps the most effective frontman at work in the world today. “He’s literally got everything,” is how JT sees it, and while much of what JT says is inevitably nonsense, it’s impossible to disagree. NH
INTERVIEWDiego Costa: Silence the critics
In years to come you lucky people will be badgered by children, their eyes wide with astonishment and widescreen with YouTube, eager to ask what Zlatan Ibrahimovic was like. You will tell them that on this occasion the internet doesn't lie: the clipreel of gobsmacking goals, the tales about (and from) that spiky persona. And the good news is that as yet, age appears not to be withering him – at time of writing he's bagged 84 in 102 for PSG, whom he seems intent on dragging to the sharp end of the Champions League. GP
INTERVIEWIbrahimovic: How to play like a targetman
It just keeps on getting better and better for the Welsh wizard. Having secured a dream move (not least for his bank manager) from White Hart Lane to the Bernabeu last summer, Bale settled quickly, even scoring Madrid's Copa del Rey winner against Barcelona and a momentum-changing goal in extra time of the Champions League final against Atletico Madrid. The sight of him posing with the trophy half an hour later was hard to begrudge, even for the bitterest Arsenal fan. Now, with UEFA altering their European Championship qualification system to Mickey Mouse settings to include a greater number of teams in the finals, there's genuine belief that Bale – with a little help from Aaron Ramsey – could drag Wales to their first major tournament in 58 years. Certainly two goals, including a sensational free-kick, on a shoddy Andorran pitch, showed his desire to make waves on the international stage too. MA
INTERVIEWBale: Terrorise the defence
The best goalkeeper in the world? For sure. The best player in the world? Not quite, but closer than any other keeper has been. In 2014, Manuel Neuer didn’t just help Germany win the World Cup and Bayern the domestic double; via his daring antics as last line for club and country he helped redefine the entire concept of modern goalkeeping. Neuer’s sweeper-keeper approach was most prominently on display in the World Cup second round against Algeria, when he operated virtually as a fifth defender by making crucial defensive interventions outside his own area, his skill and anticipation prompting national team coach Joachim Löw to describe him as the ‘perfect player’. Who are we to argue? JF
FEATURE Neuer and the evolution of the goalkeeper
Never has a man been awarded best player at a World Cup and looked so uniquely crestfallen, so utterly bemused. Messi had a disappointing year in the eyes of many, yet he still notched 41 goals and 16 assists in all competitions for Barcelona. He carried Argentina to a first World Cup final since 1990, scored four goals (including two crucial winners) and won player of the tournament, but was still criticised heavily for going missing – particularly in the final during which he spurned a golden chance at 0-0. Messi remains one of the world’s best players, but such is life at football’s sharp end that he drops down a place. It’s tough at the top. JF
FEATUREWhy Messi's future is as mentor, not master
VIDEOMessi: float like a butterfly, sting like a flea
Lahm may not have been educated in the talent labs of La Masia, but there’s no doubting that he’s Pep Guardiola’s type of player: composed, confident in possession and, crucially, intelligent enough to employ his manager’s ideas. That the player once hailed as the world’s greatest right-back managed to seamlessly slot in as Bayern Munich’s trusted midfield pivote suggests as much. When the Bundesliga champions were rocked by injuries to Bastian Schweinsteiger, Javi Martinez and Thiago Alcantara, Lahm didn’t just deputise – he excelled. Central to Bayern’s record-breaking season and captain of Germany’s World Cup winners; suffice to say, 2014 was a fine year for this most trustworthy of talismans. JB
FEATURE Why Lahm is the world's second-best player… at least
PERFORMANCE Shield the ball like Philipp Lahm
It hasn’t been a perfect 2014 for CR7. Atletico pipped Real Madrid to the title, and in Brazil, Portugal whimpered out while his long-time top-spot rival Messi almost dragged Argentina to glory. He wasn’t the best player in the Champions League final, either, even if he did capture every front page thanks to his topless showboating. But ultimately, Ronaldo earned the right to be poster boy for the side that finally earned the lusted-after Decima. His heroics throughout the quest are the kind of thing you ultimately get statues for. He was the tournament’s top scorer, with 17 goals, and he got them when they counted, including two in the semi-final bludgeoning of Bayern.
Ronny has taken that form into 2014/15’s tournament, too. Having swiped the top spot in our rankings from Messi last year, it’s going to take something special to stop him from completing an impressive hat-trick in 12 months' time. NM
FEATURE How Cristiano Ronaldo became the best – and why his decline is still a long way off
THE FFT 100: 100-91 • 90-81 • 80-71 • 70-61 • 60-51 • 50-41 • 40-31 • 30-21 • 20-11 • 10-1
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