Claim: Cristiano Ronaldo was a professional athlete.

The Ballon d'Or -LRB- -LSB- balɔ̃ dɔʁ -RSB- ; `` Golden Ball '' -RRB- , is an annual association football award presented by France Football . It has been awarded since 1956 , although between 2010 and 2015 , an agreement was made with FIFA and the award was temporarily merged with the FIFA World Player of the Year , and known as the FIFA Ballon d'Or . Conceived by sports writer Gabriel Hanot , the Ballon d'Or award honours the male player deemed to have performed the best over the previous year , based on voting by football journalists . Originally , only European players were in contention for the Ballon d'Or : in 1995 the award was expanded to include all players at European clubs and in 2007 to all players from around the world .