After winning Euro 2025 and the Champions League in 2025, could Alessia Russo end Spanish dominance in the Ballon d’Or?
Russo has enjoyed the best season of her career to date and there is definitely a chance that the striker could become the first English player to win the award.
Alessia Russo’s best year of football
There is no doubt that 2024/25 has been the best year of Alessia Russo’s career, with the Arsenal and England superstar winning almost everything that she competed in.
Although the Gunners finished distant runners up to Chelsea in the WSL Russo still outplayed every forward in the league.
The 26-year-old scored 12 league goals to win the golden boot for the first time in her career.
In the Champions League Russo finished with seven goals in 11 games and she played an instrumental role in the club’s first ever European title.
Of course it wasn’t just club football that Russo excelled in with the Lionesses crowned Euro 2025 champions.
Russo didn’t have much of a goalscoring impact in the early stages of the tournament, but with one goal and four assists in the group stage she played a key role in England’s early success.
In the knockouts Russo was quiet again right up until the final when she came up big for her country.
With England struggling against Spain in the final, Russo provided a goal right when they needed it the most.
The striker latched onto a Chloe Kelly cross with half an hour left to play and sent fans across the country into delirium with a precise header into the far corner.
That celebration!
Look at what it means! #BBCFootball #WEuro2025 pic.twitter.com/gABp15RaYg
— Match of the Day (@BBCMOTD) July 27, 2025
After a sensational campaign, Russo has a chance of ending recent Spanish dominance in the Ballon d’Or.
Spanish dominance in the Ballon d’Or
In the past four years there have only been two winners of the Ballon d’Or Feminin.
Alexia Putellas and Aitana Bonmati have dominated the award, with both Barcelona midfielders winning everything on the pitch for club and country.
Putellas became the first player to win back to back awards between 2021-22 but her run was halted after she tore her ACL.
While Putellas was away from the pitch Bonmati came into her own. Without her teammate, Bonmati won the Champions League, Liga F and the World Cup in her best year to date.
Last year Bonmati took the award home yet again with 19 goals from midfield helping Barcelona sweep every title available.
The 27-year-old was also crucial in Spain’s first-ever Nations League success.
Every Ballon d’Or Feminin winner
- 2018: Ada Hegerberg, Lyon
- 2019: Megan Rapinoe, Reign FC
- 2020: no winner due to covid
- 2021: Alexia Putellas, Barcelona
- 2022: Alexia Putellas, Barcelona
- 2023: Aitana Bonmati, Barcelona
- 2024: Aitana Bonmati, Barcelona
Lucy Bronze and Beth Mead have both finished runner up for the Ballon d’Or Feminin (in 2019 and 2022 respectively), but no English player has ever won the award.
While Russo holds every chance of breaking England’s duck, Bonmati and Putellas are both hoping to take home a historic third success.
Russo’s Arsenal teammate, Maria Caldentey, also can’t be forgotten and the two Euro 2025 final goalscorers may be ahead of the rest of the world right now in the Ballon d’Or race.
