No players based in the English Premier League (EPL) have been selected for the 2016 World XI that was announced at the inaugural The Best FIFA Awards ceremony in Zurich, yesterday.
Organised by FIFPro, the body that represents players’ associations from 69 countries, the team is decided by professional footballers, with 26,516 voting this year.
The absence of any Premier League talent in the team comes despite English and Welsh clubs providing the most votes, a record 1,884.
Manchester United’s Paul Pogba, however, missed out on one of the three midfield berths by an agonising two votes, the smallest margin in the award’s 12-year history – a count FIFPro verified with a Dutch-based public notary.
The Frenchman, the world’s most expensive player, made the team in 2015 for his all-action displays for Juventus.
Premier League-based players have made the team 24 times, a distant second to the 80 selections for the Spanish top flight, with La Liga dominating the 2016 selection.
Argentinian winger Angel di Maria was chosen for the 2014 team and Brazilian defender David Luiz made the 2013 side but both played in two countries in those years.
The last two English-based players to make the team having spent the entire year at a Premier League club were Manchester United duo Wayne Rooney and Nemanja Vidic in 2011.
Rooney, who equalled Bobby Charlton’s Manchester United goalscoring record at the weekend, is the last Englishman to be honoured in this way by his global peers but failed to make the 55-strong shortlist this year for the first time.
The only Englishman on the list was Jamie Vardy, who finished 13th out of 15 forwards in the voting.
Wales and Real Madrid star Gareth Bale was the only other British player in the reckoning, coming seventh in the same category.
In total, 15 Premier League players were on the shortlist and, if only English votes counted, Manchester City’s Kevin de Bruyne would have made the final team but the wider electorate had him as the ninth-best midfielder last season.
These results underline the remarkable contrast between the Premier League’s global popularity, as evidenced by its huge broadcasting revenues, and the apparent quality gap with Spain, whose clubs have dominated European club competition in recent years.