Alisson was ‘disrespected’ with Ballon d’Or award snub says ex-Liverpool coach

Former Liverpool goalkeeping coach John Achterberg has claimed it is “disrespectful” that Alisson has been snubbed from the Yashin Trophy for the last two years.

The Yashin Trophy is an award created by France Football, who also run the Ballon d’Or award for the world’s best player.

Once France Football has made its 10 nominations, former Ballon d’Or winners then vote for who they think is the best goalkeeper in the world.

In 2019, Alisson won the inaugural prize named after legendary Soviet goalkeeper Lev Yashin, when he triumphed in the Champions League, but he has found himself not even nominated in the last two years.

This is something former Liverpool goalkeeping coach John Achterberg claimed is “disrespectful” towards the Brazilian.

Speaking to LFC Transfer Room, Achterberg said: “Ali, you know, he has been the best in the world really for the last few years in my opinion. I can say that now because now I’m not his coach, but I look at it from the outside.

“It’s probably a little bit disrespectful that the last two years he’s not really involved in the Yashin Trophy, and I know it might be done only on the Champions League, but in the first year, he was definitely I think, in the Champions League and he was not even in the top 10.”

The season Achterberg is referring to here is the 2022/23 season, when the Reds were comprehensively knocked out by Real Madrid in the last 16 of the Champions League.

The current Al-Ettifaq coach continued: “I’m not sure who is in charge there, but probably they don’t have a clue about goalkeeping too much because I think it’s really disrespectful that he’s not even in the top five, but you know, that’s for other people to decide.”

Last year’s Yashin Trophy was won by World Cup winner Emiliano Martinez, with Ederson and Yassine Bounou making up the rest of the top three – Aaron Ramsdale and Andre Onana were also nominated.

This year’s nominees are Ronwen Williams, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Diogo Costa, Mike Maignan, Andriy Lunin, Yann Sommer, Gregor Kobel, Unai Simon, Martinez and soon-to-be-Red Giorgi Mamardashvili.

Reviewing the lists, we can confidently say that Alisson is a better goalkeeper than probably all those players.

However, he missed a lot of the last season through injury and didn’t win a major trophy, something these awards are often judged on.

During the 2023/24 campaign, Alisson wasn’t involved in Liverpool’s League Cup triumph and missed 10 Premier League matches.

If he can help lead Liverpool to Premier League or Champions League success this time around, though, he would surely get himself back on the list of nominees at the very least.

This year’s Yashin Trophy winner will be announced on October 28, the same night as the Ballon d’Or presentation.

As we can’t have Alisson there, we’ll be hoping Mamardashvili wins!