Cristiano Ronaldo, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Lionel Messi.
Known for flirting with controversy, former Sweden and Barcelona footballer Zlatan Ibrahimovic made one of his most characteristic comments on Ballon d'Or in December 2018, according to Record.pt. The statement, which is doing the rounds once again, referred to Real Madrid president Florentino Perez's influence on it.
To give more depth to the incident, Luka Modric won the prestigious award in 2018, breaking a 10-year streak that saw Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi win the award five times each. During an interview, Ibrahimovic had suggested that Perez had a say in who the award went to.
"Now we know that the person competing with Messi for the Ballon d'Or was Florentino Pérez and not Cristiano Ronaldo," Ibrahimovic had said to Fox Sports back in December 2018.
