The contenders for this year’s FIFA Ballon d’Or award for the best player of 2014 and for the FIFA Women’s World Player of the Year 2014 award were announced today on FIFA.com, francefootball.fr and YouTube.

In alphabetical order, the FIFA Ballon d’Or nominees are: Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal), Lionel Messi (Argentina) and Manuel Neuer (Germany), while Nadine Kessler (Germany), Marta (Brazil) and Abby Wambach (USA) will contest the women’s award.

The candidates for the FIFA World Coach of the Year for Men’s Football and FIFA World Coach of the Year for Women’s Football awards were also announced. In alphabetical order, the contenders are: Carlo Ancelotti (Italy/Real Madrid CF), Joachim Loew (Germany/German national team) and Diego Simeone (Argentina/Atletico de Madrid) for the FIFA World Coach of the Year for Men’s Football award, and Ralf Kellermann (Germany/VfL Wolfsburg), Maren Meinert (Germany/Germany U-19 and U-20 national teams) and Norio Sasaki (Japan/Japan national team) for the FIFA World Coach of the Year for Women’s Football award.

All the nominees were confirmed after a voting process which was open to the captains and head coaches of the men’s and women’s national teams of the 209 member associations as well as to international media representatives selected by FIFA and France Football voted for candidates.

The percentages of the collected votes are as follows (number of votes/number of associations):
Voting for men’s awards:
Member associations (captains & coaches): 87%
Media representatives: 94%
Voting for women’s awards:
Member associations (captains & coaches): 83%
Media representatives: 77%

The voting procedure for each of the awards is supervised and monitored by the independent observer PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Switzerland.

The shortlist of 15 forwards for the FIFA FIFPro World XI was also announced, completing the final shortlist of 55 players also featuring five goalkeepers, 20 defenders and 15 midfielders.

The forward shortlist is (home country, club):
Sergio Aguero (Argentina/Manchester City FC); Gareth Bale (Wales/Real Madrid CF); Karim Benzema (France/Real Madrid CF); Diego Costa (Spain/Chelsea FC); Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal/Real Madrid CF); Zlatan Ibrahimovic (Sweden/Paris St-Germain FC); Robert Lewandowski (Poland/FC Bayern Munich); Lionel Messi (Argentina/FC Barcelona); Thomas Muller (Germany/FC Bayern Munich); Neymar (Brazil/FC Barcelona); Marco Reus (Germany/Borussia Dortmund); Arjen Robben (Netherlands/FC Bayern Munich); Franck Ribery (France / FC Bayern Munich); Wayne Rooney (England/Manchester United FC); Luis Suarez (Uruguay/FC Barcelona).

In addition, the three nominees for the FIFA Puskás Award for the “most beautiful goal of the year” were announced. The three final goals are: Stephanie Roche - 20 October 2013, Peamount United v Wexford Youths, BEWNL (Ireland Republic); James Rodriguez - 28 June 2014, Colombia v Uruguay, 2014 FIFA World Cup™; Robin van Persie - 13 June 2014, Spain v Netherlands, 2014 FIFA World Cup™.

All the awards will be presented at the FIFA Ballon d’Or award ceremony at the Kongresshaus in Zurich on 12 January 2015 during a televised show to be streamed live on FIFA.com and FIFA on YouTube.

In addition to the above awards, the recipient of the FIFA Presidential Award and the winner of the FIFA Fair Play award will also be revealed during the award ceremony.