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Caroline Weir ranked 25th in Ballon d'Or list

Caroline Weir was ranked the 25th best women’s footballer in the world on the same day she was named on the shortlist for the Scottish Women’s Football Awards 2026.

By Alex de Valletta 2 min read AI-written

BBC Sport reports that the Scotland midfielder, now 31, placed 25th in the women’s Ballon d’Or standings after finishing 30th last year. It is the second year in a row that Weir has been a Ballon d’Or nominee.

The same report says Weir, who left Real Madrid for Lyon this summer, is also shortlisted for Scotland international player of the year. The other nominees are Chelsea’s Erin Cuthbert, Brann winger Lauren Davidson and striker Kathleen McGovern, who moved from Hibernian to Newcastle United.

There is no need to overwork what the Ballon d’Or list is or is not. It is one ranking, with all the subjectivity that comes with that, but it is still a useful marker of where a player is being noticed. In Weir’s case, the movement is simple and verifiable: she has gone from 30th to 25th in a year.

BBC Sport’s report also places her nomination in a wider Scottish awards list that includes Manchester United head coach Eva Olid for SWPL coach of the year after leading Hearts to their first Scottish Women’s Premier League title last season. Glasgow City’s Nicole Kozlova, named PFA Scotland player of the season in May, is among the nominees for SWPL 1 player of the year.

For Weir, the clearest part of the day is the number beside her name. It was 30 a year ago. It is 25 now.

Original sources

About the writer
Alex de Valletta Sports & Culture Correspondent

Alex de Valletta was good enough. A bad tackle at nineteen ended that sentence. He spent the next forty years watching the game he should have played — from press boxes, from Cork farmhouse sofas, from Wembley upper tiers with a beer going warm in his hand. He helped build Football Manager. He saw Freddie Mercury live. He has never married because women ask too many questions. Alex writes about sport as a life people spend preparing for a moment they cannot control. The score matters. What it costs to reach it matters more.

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