Real Madrid star Jude Bellingham is the hot favourite to win the Kopa trophy, or European Golden Boy award, but he may get a helping hand from Taylor Swift.
Or rather her fans. Bellingham is one of five La Liga players up for the award, including Barcelona’s Alejandro Balde. The Spanish international was one of the favourites to win it with Bellingham, but has fallen far behind in the standings, which are open to public vote.
Marca claim that Bellingham received a massive bump in the vote (leading 49.5% to Balde’s 27.5%) off the back of ‘Swifties’ backing him. Comments from Balde were picked up by Swift’s online community, where Balde allegedly said ‘No, I don’t like Taylor Swift’s music’.
One tweet about Balde’s comment has racked up over 8.2m impressions and it appears it might give Bellingham the edge. The third-place candidate is currently Lewis Hall of Newcastle United, who has 6% of the vote.
No doubt Bellingham has more than enough arguments to win the award without taking into account music twist, but it is yet another bizarre day in the world of voting for individual awards. Highly subjective, Taylor Swift fans will be doing a better job than many international managers and players who vote for the Ballon d’Or in many eyes.
