EXCLUSIVE Ballon d'Or Special: Why Lionel Messi Should Win

Having seen Cristiano Ronaldo win the Ballon d'Or awards for 2013 and 2014, Lionel Messi was not planning on letting him lift the trophy he had earned the four previous years again.

Neymar, Suarez and Messi racked up 122 goals in total last season, an obscene figure, with the trident eclipsing the efforts of Gareth Bale, Karim Benzema and Ronaldo in the capital. Barcelona ended up winning an historic treble with the strikers' goals firing them to La Liga, Copa del Rey and Champions League triumphs. But the key reason for success was and always will be, when Messi is part of the team. He scored 58 times, including a massive 43 in La Liga. The Argentine brings so much more to the team than simply finishing moves. He starts them too, threading plays together, and dictating matches from start to finish.

The previous season this happened less, Messi was more human. Now he has returned to his extra-terrestrial best. Messi is a constant presence throughout matches. He doesn't just show up in flashes, drifting in and out. In every move Barcelona put together he is usually on the ball at least once, but usually on multiple occasions. It was Messi that scored the goal that won Barcelona La Liga, brilliantly evading Atletico Madrid's defenders to fire home at the Vicente Calderon on May 17, avenging events 12 months previously, where the Rojiblancos emerged triumphant at Camp Nou, to lift the title. Messi struck twice against Athletic Bilbao in the Copa del Rey final too, helping them see off the Basque side 3-1. His first goal, breaking the deadlock, was one of the finest in his career.

Although he didn't score in the Champions League final himself, he was instrumental in Barcelona's performance to see off Juventus in Berlin and complete the treble. His best performance in the semi-final against Bayern Munich, Messi killed that tie in the first leg, scoring twice late on to help Barcelona to a 3-0 win, with his jagged movement bewildering Jerome Boateng, who fell down flat as Messi breezed past him, before dinking the ball cutely over Manuel Neuer, the world's best goalkeeper. The goal was named the best of the season in the Champions League, he was picked as the best player in Europe. Messi was the joint top scorer in the competition, along with Neymar and Ronaldo.

Later in the year he won the European Super Cup, scoring two brilliant free kicks against Sevilla, and Barcelona could yet lift the Club World Cup in December to complete an incredible year. Messi has had a flawless year on an individual level and even Ronaldo knows it. When a player who rates himself as highly as the Portuguese does picks Messi out as the Ballon d'Or winner, you know he deserves it.