Barcelona president Joan Laporta sends message to Lamine Yamal after Ballon d'Or snub

What stood between Lamine Yamal and the Ballon d'Or this time?

Spain won the World Cup on July 19, beating Argentina 1-0 after Ferran Torres scored in the 106th minute of the final. Yamal finished the tournament as a world champion at 19, the strongest piece of Laporta's case. He also scored one goal across the tournament, and that number sits badly next to the two players who beat him.

Kane scored 73 goals across the season for Bayern Munich and England, and he led England to the World Cup semifinals on his way to becoming the first English winner since Michael Owen in 2001. Mbappe scored 10 times at the World Cup and finished as the competition's all-time leading scorer with 22 goals.

The voters had a world champion with one goal at the tournament on one side and two strikers with historic totals on the other, and they went with the goals, maybe.

Yamal did leave London with the Kopa Trophy as the world's best young player for a third straight year, and he used the moment to point at a teammate.

"This prize should have been for him. He deserves it," Yamal said of FC Barcelona defender Pau Cubarsi when he accepted it.

"This is unique, and Lamine has achieved it since he was sixteen years old, and it is an achievement that deserves praise. He deserves everything, and we will all help him to be more motivated to win this award next year," Laporta said of the Kopa streak.

Laporta also said the result had to be accepted in a sporting spirit. Yamal's family has been less restrained. His uncle, Abdul Abdellaoui, told Cadena SER's El Larguero that voters keep falling back on the idea that the 19-year-old has time, and he became the third person close to Yamal in just over a year to predict a win that has not arrived yet.

"If you like football, you go to see Lamine, not Harry Kane. Lamine will win more than one, but the sadness will pass in three days," Abdellaoui said.