What’s the story?
As per Marca, Andres Iniesta personally called up the Real Madrid players to apologise for the non-attendance of Barcelona players in the Gala BEST FIFA Awards Ceremony held yesterday in Zurich where Cristiano Ronaldo beat Lionel Messi to be named the first ever BEST FIFA Men’s Player of the Year.
In recorded message, Iniesta had said -
“We want to show our gratitude at having been chosen and apologise for not coming to the gala. We have a hugely important game against Athletic and so we couldn't be there.”
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But Marca says that after the ceremony, Iniesta also called up his international teammates to apologise for their “thoughtlessness”
In case you didn’t know...
None of Barcelona’ s players, or the coach, made it to the event citing professional reasons – they face Athletic Bilbao in the Copa Del Rey round-of-16-second leg tomorrow night (early morning day after here in India) and face a challenge as they trail the Basques 2-1 from the first leg in San Mames. Hence, Barcelona’s directors attended the ceremony but not the players.
The heart of the matter
This was not received well at all by Real Madrid’s representatives (players, coach and management) as they took offence to what they called a snub for the ceremony. Gerard Pique, Andres Iniesta, Luis Suarez and Lionel Messi all made it to the FIFPro XI (and at least three of those names were certainties) and Messi was, of course, nominated for the most prized award of them all – BEST Men’s Players of the Year.
FIFA themselves were less than pleased with the absence of the Catalan club – especially as the aforementioned names had been slated to come in for the ceremony. As per Marca, Iniesta said that this decision had nothing to do with the players and in fact was down to a difference of opinion with the club’s hierarchy
What next?
Cristiano Ronaldo referenced their absence in his thank you speech with a burn that is sure to sour things even further between the two great rivals –
“I am sorry that some people from Barcelona aren't here with us... but that is understandable.”
Also, Read – Cristiano Ronaldo - Is he the Greatest European Footballer of All Time?
Even though Iniesta may have apologised, tensions will run high between the two clubs – at all levels – and Barcelona will have to do something to return to the good books of FIFA – for whom these awards were a matter of great prestige (especially since they had just broken away from the pre-eminent Ballon d’Or Awards)
Sportskeeda’s Take
The gesture was in poor taste by Barcelona. While it is true that they have a crunch match coming up – a quick flight in and out of Zurich could have been done without disturbing any of those preparations. Especially since they seem to keep flying in an out of Qatar for practice sessions. If not the whole team, the presence of star players like Lionel Messi and Andres Iniesta (at the very least) would have been expected.
At the moment, it feels a bit like a case of the sour grapes. This, of course, may not be the case – but what you project to the outside world is of the utmost importance and this snub has done Barcelona no good whatsoever.
