Take a look down the list of Ballon d’Or winners since its 1956 inception, and one player – or rather, one flag – stands out a mile.
Argentina, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Brazil, England, Spain and the Soviet Union have dominated the awards. When the Ballon d'Or has not gone to players from those countries, it has been almost exclusively scooped by a standout player from a European nation: Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Ukraine have all been represented.
