FIFA announce nominees for BEST Men's Player of the Year award 2017

The BEST Award seems to be FIFA's answer to France Football Magazine's Ballon D'or; after the two entities split last year, Cristiano Ronaldo became the first recipient of the Award when he walked away with it (and the Ballon d'Or) after a scintillating 2016 where he not only won the UEFA Champions League with Real Madrid and then crowned it by guiding Portugal to their first ever major international trophy in the 2016 Euros.

His 2017 has been a continuation of the brilliance he exhibited last year - his smashing form in this calendar year (a hat trick each against Bayern Munich and Atletico Madrid, and a brace against Juventus - in the QF, SF, and finals respectively!) has seen Madrid sweep to their first Champions League/La Liga double since 1958, and as he showed during the first leg of the Supercopa 2017, he's started this season on fire!

The runner up for both awards - Lionel Messi - has had a brilliant 2017 on a purely individual level (and some will argue that an individual award should only take into account individual performances) but with both Barcelona and Argentina struggling, this one could be a tough ask for Messi to pull off.

Juventus' venerable veteran Gianluigi Buffon is an outside bet for the award, with his superb-as-ever performances guiding Juventus to an unprecedented sixth straight scudetto and the final of the UEFA Champions League.

Here's the full list of potential candidates for the BEST FIFA Men's player of the year:

Pierre Emerick-Aubameyang - Borussia Dortmund

Gianluigi Buffon - Juventus

Leonardo Bonnucci - Juventus/AC Milan

Cristiano Ronaldo - Real Madrid

Antoine Griezmann - Atletico Madrid

Dani Carvajal - Real Madrid

Paulo Dybala - Juventus

Eden Hazard - Chelsea

Andres Iniesta - Barcelona

Zlatan Ibrahimovic - Manchester United

N'Golo Kante - Chelsea

Robert Lewandowski - Bayern Munich

Harry Kane - Tottenham Hotspur

Toni Kroos - Real Madrid

Marcelo - Real Madrid

Luka Modric - Real Madrid

Lionel Messi - Barcelona

Manuel Neuer - Bayern Munich

Sergio Ramos - Real Madrid

Keylor Navas - Real Madrid

Neymar - Barcelona/PSG

Alexis Sanchez - Arsenal

Arturo Vidal - Bayern Munich

Luis Suarez - Barcelona

FIFA Men's' Coach of the Year nominees - Earlier, FIFA had already announced the list for Mens' Coach, Women's' Coach and Women's' player of the year:

Massimiliano Allegri - Juventus

Carlo Ancelotti - Bayern Munich

Antonio Conte - Chelsea

Luis Enrique - Barcelona

Pep Guardiola - Manchester City

Leonardo Jardim - Monaco

Joachim Low - Germany

Jose Mourinho - Manchester United

Mauricio Pochettino - Tottenham Hotspur

Diego Simeone - Atletico Madrid

Tite - Brazil

Zinedine Zidane - Real Madrid

This, meanwhile are the shortlists for BEST Women's' Coach of the year and Women's' Player of the year