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Carli Lloyd is a finalist to be named the FIFA Best women’s player of 2017.
Your three candidates for #TheBest FIFA Women’s Player 2017:#DeynaCastellanos#CarliLloyd#LiekeMartens
— #FIFAWWC (@FIFAWWC) September 22, 2017
Who will be crowned #TheBest? pic.twitter.com/weJH9DCfB5
The original shortlist of 10 players was as follows:
Lucy Bronze (ENG)
Deyna Castellanos (VEN)
Pernille Harder (DEN)
Sam Kerr (AUS)
Carli Lloyd (USA)
Dzsenifer Marozsan (GER)
Lieke Martens (NED)
Vivianne Miedema (NED)
Wendie Renard (FRA)
Jodie Taylor (ENG)
European players were heavily represented this year due to the Euros, which the Netherlands won in style.
As for Lloyd, this year she scored five goals and two assists total for both club and country, including her time at Manchester City in the FA WSL. Out of that, she scored one goal and two assists for the USWNT in 10 games. Her one goal was against Russia in an April friendly in Houston.
Look, we here at Stars & Stripes love Carli Lloyd to bits and her contributions to the women’s game through her tireless play for the USWNT and for her clubs are certainly remarkable. But Lloyd making the final three for this year’s best women’s player in the world award when Sam Kerr did not, or even any one of the European players who did well in the Euros did not, is a continued reflection of both the broken voting system and the lack of attention and care many of those voters have for women’s soccer. It would have been pathetically easy to look up Carli Lloyd’s stats on the year to see she has had, by any standard, a rather average year, which included a three-game suspension for elbowing someone in the head.
Meanwhile Lieke Martens helped guide her country to its first ever Euro, while Sam Kerr has 16 goals and three assists in NWSL this season and seven goals and three assist in nine games for Australia. She helped Australia win the Tournament of Nations, which included beating the United States for the first time, and she was instrumental when they met Brazil three times and beat them three times this year.
You can read up on how voting for these awards is done here. Long story short though, WNT coaches and captains and one select journalist from each FIFA country make weighted votes for first, second, and third. Fans also add 25% of the vote.
The winner of the award will be announced October 23 in London.