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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.^[1] Diego Maradona and Pelé were joint winners of the award.^[2][3]

Background[edit]

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.^[4] 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.^[5]

FIFA Internet vote[edit]

The results of FIFA's internet Poll were as follows:^[6]

Rank	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[edit]

This part of the award was decided by the FIFA Magazine readers vote and the FIFA Grand Jury.^[6]

Rank	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%

References[edit]