WORLD CUP CHAMPIONS ARGENTINA DOMINATES AWARDS LIST
By Eniola Olatunji
Argentina dominated the individual awards of the Qatar 2022 world cup with Lionel Messi aged 35 in his last world cup out declared as Golden Ball Award winner for the most valuable player of the tournament, his second win. Kylian Mbappe of France won the Sliver Ball and Captain of Croatia, Luka Modric was third best with the Bronze Ball award.
Kylian Mbappe won the Golden boot for the highest goal scorers’ award with 8 goals; Lionel Messi got the Silver boot with 7 goals and Oliver Giroud took the bronze boot.
The Golden Gloves went to the Argentine Goalkeeper, Emiliano Martinez who saved two penalties in the finals.
Argentine Enzo Fernandez aged 21 won the Young player award of Qatar 2022, taking over from Kylian Mbappe who won the award in 2018. Enzo played all seven matches at the group and Knockout stages.
Three countries got a red card each namely Wales; Cameroon and Morocco. Argentina got the highest number of yellow cards which is 16; Saudi 14 and Netherlands 11. Argentina got the highest foul calls of 111; Croatia was next with 94 and France 89.
A total of 172 goals were scored in 64 games so played making an average of 2.69 goals per match. A total of 3,404,252 fans came to watch matches which are 53,191 fans per match.
England that prides herself as the home of football won the Fair Play trophy.
Total $440m prize money is on the line from FIFA. The Champion on December 18, Argentina carts home $42m and the runners-up, France $30m. The Bronze medalist, Croatia bags $27m; 4th place holder, Morocco $25m; teams ousted at the Quarterfinals placing 5th to 8th (four of them) will take $17m each; the 8teams of the round of 16, placing 9th to 16th will each pocket $13m costing $104m and other teams that placed 17th to 32nd (16 teams) will take $9m each costing $144m.
