Cristiano Ronaldo

Cristiano Ronaldo's five Ballon d'Ors — 2008, 2013, 2014, 2016, 2017 — span three clubs and nine years, which is the point of them. He arrived at Manchester United as a trickster from Madeira whose stepovers drew jeers, and remade himself, deliberately and item by item, into a scoring machine: the leap, the heading, the free kicks, the two-footed finishing, each engineered until weakness ran out. By 2008 he was a European champion and a 42-goal winger; by 2016 and 2017 he was the axis of Real Madrid's three consecutive Champions Leagues.

The vanity is real and the discipline is realer, and the second explains the first. He has played more men's internationals than anyone in history, scored more official goals than anyone in history, and at an age when forwards become nostalgia he became a machine for reaching milestones instead. The rivalry with Messi that defined the 2010s was a gift to both of them, and his half of it was the greater feat of engineering: talent made him good; the project made him this.