Official Ballon d'Or website named three different winners hours before 2026 ceremony

Hours before the 2026 Ballon d'Or ceremony, the official Ballon d'Or website named three different winners of the men's award. Anadolu Agency and ESPN both reported this.

What ESPN reported

According to ESPN, separate articles on the site named Harry Kane, Kylian Mbappé and Lamine Yamal as the winner.

ESPN said the articles appeared about two and a half hours before the ceremony was due to begin at the London Palladium on Monday. According to ESPN, all three articles were removed from the organisers' website after screenshots had circulated on social media.

ESPN quoted the headline of one article as "Harry Kane wins 2026 Ballon d'Or". According to ESPN, that article focused on the Bayern Munich striker's goalscoring in the 2025-26 season. A second article said Barcelona's Yamal had become the youngest winner in the award's 70-year history. A third credited the consistency of Real Madrid forward Mbappé at the highest level.

Context

According to ESPN, Kane, Mbappé and Yamal are among the leading contenders for the 2026 award. ESPN reported that Kane would be the first Englishman to win since Michael Owen in 2001. Yamal, 19, would be the youngest winner in history. Mbappé is seeking his first Ballon d'Or.

ESPN also reported that this is the first year the award is being presented in London. The 2026 winner is due to be officially announced during Monday evening's ceremony.

What is not known

The reports reviewed by Vocemundi do not include any statement or explanation from the Ballon d'Or organisers. They do not describe why the articles were published. For example, they do not say whether the articles were drafts prepared in advance, or the result of a technical error or unauthorised access.

The reports do not give the exact times the articles were published and removed. They do not describe how the articles or the screenshots were verified as coming from the official site. They also do not say whether any of the articles matches the eventual official winner.

Anadolu Agency's report reviewed by Vocemundi consists only of a headline. It does not name the players or give further detail. Neither outlet credits the other. However, both may rest on the same publicly visible website content or social-media screenshots. Only ESPN provides details.

Analysis

Because three different winners were named, the articles on their own do not indicate who has won. The official announcement at the ceremony remains the only confirmation of the result. If the articles were drafts prepared in advance, the episode would point to a publishing error rather than an early disclosure of the outcome. If they resulted from a technical fault or unauthorised access, questions about the website's security could follow. Each scenario remains possible on current information. An explanation from the organisers would help clarify what happened. No such explanation is included in the reports reviewed by Vocemundi.

Produced by the Vocemundi newsroom with AI assistance.