FIFA World Cup Golden Ball award nominees

The nomination ceremony with the Golden Ball trophy

FIFA have recently announced the 10 players which will contest the player of the tournament award for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. Along with these 10 players, another three have been nominated for the best young player award.

Here are the nominees for the two awards,

FIFA Golden Ball award:

Gyan Asamoah   -   Ghana
Diego Forlan   -   Uruguay
Andres Iniesta   -   Spain
Lionel Messi   -   Argentina
Mesut Ozil   -   Germany
Arjen Robben   -   Netherlands
Bastian Schweinsteiger   -   Germany
Wesley Sneijder   -   Netherlands
David Villa   -   Spain
Xavi Hernandez   -   Spain

FIFA Young player of the tournament:

Andre Ayew   -   Ghana
Giovani Dos Santos   -   Mexico
Thomas Muller   -   Germany

It will be interesting to see how the final and the battle for 3rd place will affect who wins, while Xavi won the EURO 2008 best player of the tournament, we could see Wesley Sneijder or Robben claim the award for the 2010 World Cup. Another slightly interesting addition to the list is Lionel Messi, who while he had a couple of great games, failed to score and lift Argentina over Germany.

As for the Young player of the tournament award, the three nominees seem perfect to me, all three played well for their countries and will certainly be looked at this transfer market.