During which period was the Ballon d’Or merged with the FIFA World Player of the Year and given as the FIFA Ballon d’Or?

The correct answer is C, 2000. The awards were established in 1999 by the founders of the Laureus Sport for Good Foundation, and the first ceremony took place in 2000 at Monte Carlo in Monaco, where Nelson Mandela, the patron of the awards, said that sport has the power to change the world. Option A is wrong because 1996 is the year of the Atlanta Olympic Games and has nothing to do with these awards. Option B is wrong because 1999 is the year the awards were set up, which is the trap this question is built on: the setting up and the first ceremony fall in different years, and papers use one against the other. Option D is wrong because 2004 is the year the International Cricket Council began its own annual awards, including the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy.

The correct answer is A, Nelson Mandela. The first President of a democratic South Africa was the patron of the Laureus awards, and at the opening ceremony in 2000 he said that sport has the power to change the world and to unite people in a way that little else does; the sentence is now printed with the awards. Option B is wrong because Juan Antonio Samaranch was President of the International Olympic Committee and belongs to the Olympic movement, not to Laureus. Option C is wrong because Pele received the first Laureus Lifetime Achievement Award in 2000 but was a recipient at that ceremony and not its patron, which makes him the strongest distractor here. Option D is wrong because Sebastian Coe is a middle distance runner turned administrator, associated with athletics and with the London Games.

The correct answer is B, Best Sporting Moment. The award went to the scene after India won the World Cup of 2011, when the younger players carried Sachin Tendulkar on their shoulders around the Wankhede ground; the Best Sporting Moment is the one Laureus award decided by a public vote, which is why the Indian following mattered. Option A is wrong because the World Sportsman of the Year is an award for the season just gone and has not come to an Indian cricketer. Option C is wrong because the Lifetime Achievement Award is a separate category whose first recipient was Pele in 2000. Option D is wrong because the Comeback of the Year is given for a return after injury or a long absence, which is not what the 2020 award recognised.

The correct answer is B, France Football. The French magazine France Football created the Ballon d’Or in 1956 on the idea of its editor Gabriel Hanot, and the winner is settled on the votes of journalists, which is what separates it from an award given by a federation. Option A is wrong because L’Equipe is the French sports daily from the same publishing house and is remembered for proposing the European Cup, not the Ballon d’Or. Option C is wrong because World Soccer is a British magazine that runs awards of its own, which are not the Ballon d’Or. Option D is wrong because Marca is a Spanish sports daily that gives the Pichichi trophy to the leading scorer of the Spanish league and the Zamora trophy to the best goalkeeper there.

The correct answer is A, Stanley Matthews. The English winger, then playing for Blackpool and already past forty, received the first Ballon d’Or in 1956, at a time when only European players could be considered. Option B is wrong because Alfredo Di Stefano, the Real Madrid forward, won the award twice later in the nineteen fifties and is the strongest distractor because he dominated that decade. Option C is wrong because Raymond Kopa, the French forward, won in 1958, and his name now belongs to the Kopa Trophy for the best young player. Option D is wrong because Lev Yashin won in 1963 and is remembered for a different reason, as the only goalkeeper ever to take the award, after whom the Yashin Trophy is named.