Messi, Ronaldo, Benzema: Who has the most Champions League MotM awards? | OneFootball

Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are the two players that arguably spring to mind first when someone asks you about the Champions League in the 2010s – and with good reason.

The two superstars dominated the competition with Real Madrid, Juventus, Barcelona and PSG respectively, scoring goals for fun and terrorizing opposition defences.

And their performances and abilities are highlighted by the number of Man of the Match awards they collected over their careers – a total which has been shared by the team at Popfoot.

They have counted up the number of individual awards collected by players since 2009, and unsurprisingly, Ronaldo and Messi both come out on top, with 18 others trailing some way behind them.

You can check out the top players below:

The 20 players with the most Champions League MotM awards

20. Nicolas Gaitan (8 MotM from 46 games)

19. Toni Kroos, (9 MotM from 135 games)

18. Antoine Griezmann (9 MotM from 85 games)

17. Thiago (9 MotM from 80 games)

16. Edin Dzeko (9 MotM from 71 games)

15. Hulk (9 MotM from 40 games)

14. Raheem Sterling (10 MotM from 81 games)

13. Arjen Robben (10 MotM from 77 games)

LONDON, ENGLAND - MAY 25: Arjen Robben of Bayern Muenchen holds the trophy after winning the UEFA Champions League final match against Borussia Dortmund at Wembley Stadium on May 25, 2013 in London, United Kingdom. (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images)

12 Gareth Bale (10 MotM from 66 games)

11. Sadio Mane (10 MotM from 63 games)

10. Kylian Mbappe (10 MotM from 61 games)

9. Angel Di Maria (11 MotM from 93 games)

8. Zlatan Ibrahimovic (12 MotM from 64 games)

7. Willian (12 MotM from 63 games)

6. Riyad Mahrez (12 MotM from 54 games)

5. Karim Benzema (13 MotM from 130 games)

4. Robert Lewandowski (21 MotM from 111 games)

3. Neymar (23 MotM from 81 games)

2. Cristiano Ronaldo (40 MotM from 131 games)

1. Lionel Messi (67 MotM awards from 130 games)

Messi in a league of his own

How surprised can you really be that Messi comes out on top?

The World Cup winner has played in Europe’s most esteemed competition every season since 2009.

And given how key he was in Barcelona’s Champions League title-winning seasons in three different seasons since that year, is it that shocking he beats out his closest competitor by more than 20 awards?

Ronaldo second, but unlikely to improve

Ronaldo, unsurprisingly, is the closest rival to Messi in this list, although close doesn’t really apply here.

Despite having fewer Man of the Match awards to his name, he has won the competition more times than the Barcelona legend since 2009, lifting the trophy four times with Real Madrid in the 2010s.

Ronaldo was just an absolute demon in that decade, scoring both iconic and important goals along the way.

He remains the Champions League’s top scorer, with Messi just 11 goals behind.

But he appears unlikely to improve any of his Champions League totals, with the Portuguese talisman now plying his trade with Al-Nassr in Saudi Arabia and in the last years of his career.

Neymar and Lewandowski the best of the rest

Multiple players crack the top 20 with totals of nine or 10 Man of the Match awards in the Champions League, but both Lewandowski and Neymar are clear of the others.

Lewandowski has been one of the competition’s elite goal scorers, with the striker scoring 91 goals in the competition for Borussia Dortmund, Bayern Munich and Barcelona.

That includes one 15-goal campaign back in 2019/20, the year he won the competition, which was the joint third-highest tally for a single season.

Just above the marksman is Brazil and PSG star Neymar, who has two more MotM awards in the competition.

The attacker, despite dazzling on Europe’s biggest stage, has lifted the competition just once with Barcelona back in 2015 where he scored 10 goals from 12 games.

He came close in 2020 but was a part of the PSG side that Lewandowski’s Bayern beat to lift the trophy.

Nevertheless, he has scored 43 goals and registered 38 assists, and who can forget how he helped drag Barcelona past PSG in the dying minutes back in 2017?

What a performance that was from the Brazilian.

Where will Mbappe end up?

The top 10 is mostly made up of veterans or seasoned pros, but the one man who falls outside that description is Mbappe.

The French striker is still only 24 and has his best years still to come.

With 61 Champions League games under his belt already and 10 individual awards in the competition, just how many will he end his career on?