Messi won the FIFA award for a second straight year on Monday, finishing ahead of Barcelona teammates Andres Iniesta and Xavi Hernandez.

“It’s a very special day for me,” Messi said through a translator on receiving the award at a gala ceremony in FIFA’s home city.

The 23-year-old Messi amassed 58 goals last year for an exciting Barcelona team which retained the Spanish league title and leads the standings this season.

However, he failed to score in South Africa as Argentina exited in the quarterfinals. Iniesta and Xavi, by comparison, starred for eventual winner Spain.

“I didn’t expect to win it today,” Messi said.

“Already it’s a source of happiness to be here with my friends and even more to win it.”

Messi obtained 22.65 percent of the votes cast by coaches and captains of national teams plus invited journalists.

The original shortlist featured 23 players. Andres Iniesta finished second with 17.36 percent and Xavi received 16.48 percent to finish third for the second straight year.

All three candidates honed their craft at Barcelona’s celebrated La Masia youth academy.

Barcelona has now provided eight winners in the 20-year history of the FIFA honor. Messi follows former Brazil internationals Romario (1994), Ronaldo (1996 and ‘97), Rivaldo (1999) and Ronaldinho (2004 and ‘05).

The award was renamed this year after FIFA merged its world player award with the Ballon d’Or trophy, which had been presented to the best player in Europe by France Football magazine since 1956.

Jose Mourinho won the men’s coach award for leading Inter Milan to a treble including the Champions League.

Mourinho beat World Cup-winning Spain coach Vicente del Bosque and Pep Guardiola of Barcelona to the inaugural honor.

The Portuguese coach guided Inter to the Italian league and cup double before joining Real Madrid.

“The most important things for me are the collective titles, not the individual ones,” Mourinho said.

Brazil forward Marta won the women’s player award for a fifth straight year, defeating three-time German winner Birgit Prinz and Kosovo-born newcomer Lira Bajramaj.

Marta was rewarded for her outstanding season with United States women’s professional league champion Gold Pride.

Silvia Neid won the inaugural women’s coaching award for her work with the Germany national team, which defends its World Cup title at home in July.

Haitian football received the FIFA fair play award for its recovery from an earthquake which devastated the Caribbean island last January.

The FIFA presidential award was given to Archbishop Desmond Tutu in recognition of South Africa’s organization of the World Cup.

All three Ballon d’Or nominees featured in a World XI lineup chosen by FIFA and the FIFPro group of players’ unions worldwide.

The team consisted entirely of players from Barcelona, Real Madrid and European champion Inter.

Spain captain Iker Casillas from Madrid was chosen as goalkeeper. In defense, Barcelona pair Carles Puyol and Gerard Pique were joined by Inter’s Maicon and Lucio.

Wesley Sneijder of Inter completed a midfield trio comprising Iniesta and Xavi. The attack teamed Messi and David Villa, who joined Barca from Valencia in May, with Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo.

Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi have undoubtedly been the two best players in world football of the past two years, with frankly no other player coming near to them in terms of near flawless talent. However, every year other players come to the fore, and in a world cup year, where so much can be decided by what happens in those four weeks, it will be an interesting battle to see who picks up the individual accolades at the turn of the year.

The Players to Beat
Barcelona´s Argentinian wunderkind has carried on this season where he left off last year. He spearheaded Barcelona´s unprecedented Triplete of last season, and completed the 2009 football year with Barcelona by winning six trophies, including the Club World Cup. Between the 2008-09 season and the current one, his goal ratio stands at 0.75 per game, quite remarkable for a player who is not an out and out striker. He scores more goals than most of the great strikers of the game.

Though Messi adds so much more than just goals. In the Triplete season he set up 18 of Barca´s goals in all competitions. Add to that his ability to dribble, it is very rare to see Messi get disposessed and his off the ball play is second to none. Deservedly he was voted as winner of the FIFA player of the year last year, but will he be able to repeat the process?
Cristiano Ronaldo, same genius, same swagger, different club. Real Madrid´s main man is on fire for the Bernabeu club since his record move last summer, if only he can keep from becoming injured, he will be difficult to beat this year. 15 goals in 16 games for Madrid this season, it goes without saying is an incredible return, especially given that he is primarily played in a midfield role. The former Ballon d´Or and FIFA player of the year will have the world cup and reclaiming his number one spot in his sights this year.

The Players to Watch
Wayne Rooney has been outstanding for Manchester United this season. It is no coincidence that the England player has blossomed in Ronaldo´s departure. Rooney needs to be the main player in a team, and although he was still exceptional with Ronaldo, the pair formed an explosive partnership for Manchester United, he has been a different class altogether this season, often dragging United through games single-handedly.

Currently he is the only player above Messi in the race for the European golden boot. Manchester United´s 3-1 destruction of Arsenal at the Emirates stadium was mainly down to Rooney. If the Portuguese Nani can continue to produce that kind of mesmerizing form against Arsenal, continually, Rooney will finally have a partner who can bring the best out in him. In a world cup year, as we have seen before, the team that goes far or wins it often has a player named as the greatest. Fabio Cannavaro won the Ballon dÓr of 2006 after Italy lifted the world cup.

David Villa is a striker often named as one of the world´s best. The Spain coach Vicente Del Bosque has said of him, “I´d have David Villa over Kaka and Cristiano Ronaldo”. Along with Fernando Torres, he forms one of the most potent attacking lines in world football, and it takes a special kind of player to score a goal like this. As he plays for Valencia, not one of the top sides in Europe, he doesn´t get noticed as he would were he playing for Madrid or Barcelona. Winning the world cup, or at the least advancing to the latter stages of the tournament is Villa´s only realistic chance of being recognised as one of the world´s best.

There are of course, many other players who could become the world´s best player, such as Cesc Fabregas, Andres Iniesta or even Kaka again. Whatever happens, you can be sure that the four players above will be there or thereabouts.

The family has a strong football passion. Ronaldinho’s father was a football player, his mother was a big football fan and his brother is also a football player. Influenced by his family, Ronaldinho played football since he was a little kid; sometimes he even played football with a dog. “Mom was very supportive of us playing football. On Sundays, we had lunch while watching games on the football stadium. And I always felt like a happy child.” Ronaldinho said. Ronaldinho’s father died of a heart attack when Ronaldinho was just eight “Dad was always the pillar of this family. Since he died, we don’t know what to do and we could not see the future. I was so upset. But then my brother told me to move on and to take a responsibility to make the family life get better.”

Then Ronaldinho made every effort to pursue success in his football career. And he was selected for the Brazilian national
football team. When he was in the national team and scored the first goal, he looked up and pointed to the sky as if to tell his father of his success. Since then, that he points to sky after he scores is considered as that he dedicates a goal to his father.

Castrol an official sponsor of the 2010 FIFA World Cup has set up a website dedicated to displaying the performance based rankings of the best Footballers in the World. Learn where your favorite player stands.
As football is often a matter of pride and heart for the fans, rankings are usually affected by a great deal of bias. The official Castrol ranking website states that a positive aspect of these particular rankings is the fact that they are completely objective, taking the players’ actual game performances into account and disregarding hype and opinion.

How the Best Football Player Ranks are Decided
Castrol’s analysts employ a complicated system which takes into account every top player’s performance in Europe’s top five leagues. These leagues include the Spanish La Liga Primera Division, the English Premier League, the German Bundesliga, the Italian Serie A and the French Ligue Une with additional weighting being provided by the UEFA Champions League Knockout and Group Stages.

In addition to player performance, the type of game is also taken into account. For example, the more important the match, the more each player’s performance ranking is affected.
Points are handed out for every single game players perform in and these points are tallied for a total of twelve months and divided by the amount of time each player spends on the field and divided by 90 to give an average 90 minute score for each player before their rank is adjusted on the official board.

Castrol states that the reason only the top five European leagues are considered is due to the fact that almost all of the Top 10 nominees from the Ballon D’Or and FIFA World Player of the Year awards from 2004-2008 were players from the top five leagues being analysed by Castrol and they believed these leagues would provide them with as accurate an analytical system possible.

Top Names on the Best Football Player List
Lionel Messi, having been named the world’s top footballer for 2009/10 shows that his performance lives up to the hype. Castrol published an article describing how Messi is both an opportunity creator as well as a devastating goal scorer. Messi is at the top of all goal scoring tables, with his 66% accuracy rate which has helped him to score the most goals both in the UEFA Champions league as well as gain the honour of being the top scorer across all of Europe’s top five leagues.

The Castrol article also states that no other player in La Liga could match Messi’s accuracy rate or destructive skill that allowed him to place 28 shots on target while in the Champions League. He seems to be a player who can create goals out of nothing and pose a threat to the opposition in every game he plays.

Frank Lampard, according to Castrol is the world’s best midfielder. Reasons given for this honor are the facts that Lampard has the ability to score goals even from his position in the deep midfield and his uncanny strength of being able to appear in the penalty box at exactly the right time. Similarly to Messi, Lampard is also praised for his ability to set up goal opportunities and aid his teammates into firing shots at goal on target.

As for the top defender, Messi’s teammate Gerard Pique tops the Castrol rankings while USA International Marcus Hahnemann is considered to be the best goal keeper.
Castrol’s Top 10 Best Footballers in the World According to their Performance in 2009/10 are –
1. L. Messi. Forward. Barcelona. Primera Liga.
2. C. Ronaldo. Forward. R Madrid. Primera Liga.
3. D. Drogba Forward. Chelsea. Premier League.
4. W. Rooney. Forward. Man United. Premier League.
5. A. Robben. Forward. Bayern. Bundesliga.
6. G. Huguain. Forward. R Madrid. Primera Liga.
7. F. Torres. Forward. Liverpool. Premier League.
8. L. Fabiano. Forward. Sevilla. Primera Liga.
9. D. Villa. Forward. Valencia. Primera Liga.
10. EQUAL :
F. Lampard. Midfielder. Chelsea. Premier League.
I Olic. Forward. Bayern. Bundesliga.
To conclude, Castrol analysts continue to calculate player performances in order to provide what is arguably the most objective football player ranking in the world.