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Messi won the Ballon d’Or eight times, Ronaldo five times. Kroos was denied this award despite winning the Champions League six times. “It’s not a title I’ve strived for. But that has nothing to do with the fact that I’ve never won it. The profile of the world footballers was always similar. But it didn’t match my profile,” said Kroos. “But there were often world footballers in my team: Cristiano Ronaldo, Luka Modric, Karim Benzema. So I helped to make them. If we had become European champions, there would have been a chance.”
After leaving Real, Kroos played his last tournament at the European Championships. The decision to end his career was made over many months and after many discussions: “For me, it wasn’t like I woke up in the morning and said: ‘That’s it.’ My wife and I talked about the topic for weeks and months, weighing things up back and forth, so that we were both annoyed because there was no decision. But making it was difficult. I had already decided a few years ago that I wanted to make the decision to end my career alone and of my own free will.”
