FIFA Player of the Century

FIFA Player of the Century was a one-off award created by FIFA to decide the greatest football player of the 20th century, announced at the annual FIFA World gala, held in Rome on 11 December 2000. Diego Maradona and Pelé were joint winners of the award.

Background

Since 1955, FIFA has had awards for FIFA World Player of the Year and they decided to bring in the year 2000 by conducting a public vote to decide the FIFA Player of the Century. This was to be decided by votes on their official website, their official magazine, and a grand jury. Maradona won the Internet-based poll by wide margins, garnering 53.6% of the votes against 18.53% for Pelé. Despite the fact that Eusébio, who played football professionally during Pelé's era, placed third in the poll, many observers complained that the Internet nature of the poll would have meant a skewed demographic of younger fans who would have seen Maradona play, but not Pelé. As a result, FIFA decided to add a second poll and appointed a "Football Family" committee composed of football journalists, officials, and coaches, who voted Pelé the best player of the century with 72.75% of the vote, thus both were joint winners of the award.

FIFA Internet vote

The results of FIFA's internet Poll were as follows:

Player Nationality Percentage
1 Diego Maradona  Argentina 53.60%
2 Pelé  Brazil 18.53%
3 Eusébio  Portugal 6.21%
4 Roberto Baggio  Italy 5.42%
5 Romário  Brazil 1.69%
6 Marco van Basten  Netherlands 1.57%
7 Ronaldo  Brazil 1.55%
8 Franz Beckenbauer  Germany 1.50%
9 Zinedine Zidane  France 1.34%
10 Rivaldo  Brazil 1.19%
11 Zico  Brazil 1.15%
12 Garrincha  Brazil 1.08%
13 Johan Cruyff  Netherlands 0.87%
14 Alfredo Di Stéfano  Argentina
 Spain
0.68%
15 Michel Platini  France 0.58%
16 Bobby Charlton  England 0.39%
17 Ferenc Puskás  Hungary 0.37%
18 Lothar Matthäus  Germany 0.37%
19 Lev Yashin  Soviet Union 0.36%
20 George Best  Northern Ireland 0.32%

FIFA Magazine and Grand Jury vote

This part of the award was decided by the FIFA Magazine readers vote and the FIFA Grand Jury.

Player Nationality Percentage
1 Pelé  Brazil 72.75%
2 Alfredo Di Stéfano  Argentina
 Spain
9.75%
3 Diego Maradona  Argentina 6.0%
4 Franz Beckenbauer  Germany 2.5%
5 Johan Cruyff  Netherlands 2.0%
George Best  Northern Ireland 2.0%
7 Roberto Baggio  Italy 1.0%
Garrincha  Brazil 1.0%
Zico  Brazil 1.0%
Michel Platini  France 1.0%
Gerd Müller  Germany 1.0%

This page was last updated at 2024-01-24 07:20 UTC. Update now. View original page.

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