Kane ends England’s 25-year wait for Ballon d’Or as Putellas completes historic treble

LONDON – Harry Kane has been crowned Ballon d’Or winner, becoming the first Englishman in 25 years to claim men’s football’s most prestigious individual award and underlining the global reach of a season that delivered trophies for Bayern Munich and a deep run at the World Cup with England.

The Bayern striker, who captains the England national team, earned the prize after a prolific campaign in which he scored 73 goals for club and country, setting scoring marks in Germany and at the World Cup while leading England to a third-place finish.

Kane finished ahead of fellow nominees Lamine Yamal, Kylian Mbappé and Lionel Messi in the voting. The award is organized under the global framework of world football overseen by FIFA, even though the Ballon d’Or itself is run independently.

Kane’s peak year recognised on home soil

The ceremony took place in London, staged in the city for the first time as a nod to the inaugural Ballon d’Or winner, England’s Stanley Matthews, who received the prize in 1956. The return of the trophy to England evokes that early era while highlighting how rare such recognition has been for the country’s leading players.

An Englishman had not won the men’s Ballon d’Or since Michael Owen in 2001. Kane’s triumph therefore bridges a generational gap for English football, reflecting both his longevity at the elite level and the growing prominence of the Premier League era in shaping the modern game.

“My journey wasn’t straightforward. I had to fight my way to be the very best right now,” Kane said, visibly emotional after accepting the award. His words resonated in a room that included current and former stars whose careers, like his, have been shaped by the intense demands of club and international football calendars.

Dominant for Bayern, decisive on the biggest stage

Kane’s winning case was built on contributions in two of the sport’s most scrutinised environments: a title race with Bayern Munich and a World Cup campaign with England.

• He led Bayern to a domestic double, lifting both the Bundesliga and the German Cup.
• In the cup final, he scored a hat trick against Stuttgart, underlining his status as the focal point of Bayern’s attack.
• At the World Cup, he scored six times, overtaking Gary Lineker as England’s highest World Cup scorer and moving into the competition’s all-time top five.
• England reached the semifinals before losing to Argentina, with Kane wearing the captain’s armband throughout the tournament.

For Bayern, the season reinforced the value of structuring an attack around a central striker capable of sustaining high output through a long domestic campaign and knockout competitions. For England, Kane’s World Cup performance strengthened his position at the heart of selection decisions, anchoring a side that now expects to contend seriously at every major tournament.

What Kane’s Ballon d’Or means for England and Bayern

At international level, the award confirms Kane as the reference point for England’s next competitive cycle. His record World Cup scoring mark and his role in a third-place finish offer a benchmark for future squads assessed by the English Football Association and its technical staff.

At club level, Bayern’s decision to build around a traditional centre-forward is validated by a double-winning season capped by individual global recognition for its No. 9. The combination of Bundesliga and German Cup success, plus Kane’s output, reinforces the competitive pressure on domestic rivals to match that level of firepower and squad planning.

The presence of Lamine Yamal, Mbappé and Messi among the nominees also situates Kane’s year within a broader generational transition. Established stars and emerging talents shared the ballot, yet the award went to a forward whose influence stretches across both club structures and the modern, high-stakes international calendar.

Putellas reclaims women’s Ballon d’Or to cap comeback

Earlier in the evening, Spain midfielder Alexia Putellas won the women’s Ballon d’Or for the third time, further cementing her status as one of the defining players of the modern era in the women’s game.

Putellas’ latest award followed a season in which she led her former club Barcelona to multiple trophies, including the Women’s Champions League, reinforcing the club’s dominance in European competition under the structures of UEFA’s elite women’s tournaments.

Now with London City Lionesses after joining the English side in the offseason, Putellas also contributed to Spain’s victory in the Women’s Nations League last December, adding an international title to her club achievements and underlining the depth of Spain’s current generation.

Ending Bonmatí’s run and reshaping Spain’s hierarchy

The 32-year-old ended Spain teammate Aitana Bonmatí’s three-year hold on the women’s Ballon d’Or. Putellas previously won the award in consecutive years, 2021 and 2022, before suffering an ACL tear that sidelined her and coincided with Bonmatí’s rise to global prominence.

Bonmatí, who completed a women’s Ballon d’Or three-peat in 2025, was absent from this year’s shortlist after breaking her leg in December. Her absence opened space for a reconfigured hierarchy within Spain’s midfield, in which Putellas’s return to top form and honours is both a personal comeback and a substantive development for a national side managing the balance between established stars and the next wave of talent.

Putellas’s move to London City Lionesses also has structural implications for the women’s club game. A player with three Ballon d’Or titles competing outside the traditional European giants illustrates how talent is beginning to spread into ambitious clubs beyond the established superpower tier, a trend that could influence recruitment strategies and competitive balance in domestic leagues.

London ceremony underscores football’s changing power map

Staging the ceremony in London for the first time not only honoured Matthews, the inaugural winner 70 years ago, but also reflected the city’s current status as one of the game’s principal hubs for both men’s and women’s football.

Having Kane and Putellas – an England-based men’s club striker and a Spain international now playing in England – leave with the sport’s highest individual awards symbolises how domestic leagues and national teams intersect within today’s regulatory and competition frameworks. National associations, top-flight leagues and tournament organisers must now balance congested schedules, injury risk and commercial demands while enabling players like Kane and Putellas to sustain the level of performance that wins a Ballon d’Or.

On a night that looked back to Matthews and Owen while celebrating Kane and Putellas, London provided a stage where past and present met – and where the game’s evolving balance of power, across both the men’s and women’s competitions, was on full display.