A look at the Serie A and Italian candidates in the Ballon D’or shortlist and how they could fare tonight

The 2025 Ballon D’or ceremony will take place later tonight in Paris, to crown the best of the 2024/25 footballing season. A number of Italians and Serie A players have been shortlisted across the different awards to be awarded on the night. We take a look at the candidates and their chances.Men’s Ballon D’or – The biggest award of the night. Lamine Yamal and Ousmane Dembele are the frontrunners. Multiple Serie A players are involved – Inter’s Denzel Dumfries and Lautaro Martinez, Napoli’s Scott McTominay and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia who spent the first half of last season at Napoli before moving to PSG. Gianluigi Donnarumma is also nominated. Realistically, it’s very difficult to see any of the current Serie A players finishing in the top 10 but Kvaratskhelia and Donnarumma have a solid chance.Women’s Ballon D’or – Two Serie A players have been nominated for this award and both of them play for Juventus – Sofia Cantore and Cristiana Girelli. It’s difficult to see them finishing in the top 10, with the likes of Aitana Bonmati, Alessia Russo and Chloe Kelly among favourites to win.Kopa Award – This award is for the best young player in the world and unsurprisingly, Kenan Yildiz has been shortlisted for this. The Juventus attacker is expected to lose out to Desire Doue or Pau Cubarsi but it is expected that he will finish in the top 5.Yashin Award – This award is to recognise the best goalkeeper in the world in 2024/25 and it is, highly likely, that this goes to Italy and current Manchester City keeper Gianluigi Donnarumma, who helped PSG to the quadruple last season. Yann Sommer of Inter has also been nominated for the award and it is possible that he finishes in the top 3 too.Johan Cruyff Award – This award is given to the best manager in world football for the 2024/25 season. Enzo Maresca has been nominated for winning the UEFA Conference League and Club World Cup with Chelsea and Antonio Conte too has been nominated for Napoli’s Serie A win. The winner is most probably going to be PSG’s Luis Enrique in this category. Kaulik Mitra | GIFN