The finalists for the 2015 Ballon d'Or are out, and there should be no surprise that the three candidates are Cristiano Ronaldo, winner in 2008, 2013 and 2014, Lionel Messi, winner in 2009, 2010, 2011 and 2012 and second to Ronaldo the last two years, and Neymar, who will take his place on the podium for the first time. But the way Luis Suarez has been playing recently, a strong case could be made that an all-Barcelona trio should be honored: Messi, Suarez and Neymar, dubbed MSN.

France will host the European Championship next summer. With a team largely intact from the one that reached the quarterfinals of the 2014 World Cup and coming off a 2-0 friendly win over the World Cup champion Germany, the Blues should be one of the favorites next summer. There's only one problem: two of their stars, Mathieu Valbuena and Karim Benzema, are embroiled in what the French are calling l'affaire de la sextape, and the national team, it seems, is not big enough for both of them.

In an attempt to get ahead of the story, Michel Platini's lawyer, Thibaud d'Alès, said the investigatory arm of FIFA's ethics committee has recommended a lifetime ban for his client, the suspended UEFA president, and the Guardian reported suspended FIFA president Sepp Blatter should receive the same sanction in connection with the $2 million payment made to Platini in 2011 for work done years ago.

ESPN writer Tony Evans on Monday made the bold claim that the era of the "Big Four" in the English Premier League is now "dead." As it turns out, he says, the flood of international investment into English soccer has enhanced competition instead of killing it.

French soccer resumed on Friday as Nice beat second-place Lyon, 3-0, to move into third-place in the Ligue 1 table. The game at the Allianz Riviera was the first in France since the Nov 13 attacks in Paris that left 130 dead and many more injured. The Stade de France in Saint Denis was among the venues targeted during last Friday's attacks in which three attackers blew themselves up near the French national stadium, where the national team was playing world champion Germany in a friendly. At the game in Nice, fans held lit candles during a minute's silence after …

A choral version of the French national anthem will be played prior to kickoff at each Premier League match this weekend. The league is taking this dramatic step to honor the memories of those killed by terrorist attacks Friday in Paris.

Tuesday marked the completion of the playoff phase of qualifying for the 2016 European Championship in France. Playoffs have been a part of European qualifying for years. But instead of deciding the four teams that will join the 10 teams already qualified, as will be the case in qualifying for the 2018 World Cup, the Euro 2016 playoffs decided the four teams that joined the 20 teams already assured of playing next summer. UEFA decided more was merrier and expanded the tournament field from 16 to 24 teams.

The cover of this week's France Football magazine is a cartoon of a father and son. Tears in his eyes, the son, holding a French flag in one hand and his father's hand in the other, asks his father, "Papa, tu m'emmèneras voir un match de l'Euro?" ("Papa, will you take me to see a Euro match?") It's a question fans will be asking in the aftermath of Friday's bombings in which Daesh kamikazes targeted the Stade de France during the France-Germany match?

UEFA on Monday confirmed that Euro 2016 will remain in France, and that both the tournament's opener on June 10 as well as its final a month later will still be held at the Stade de France in Saint Denis.

By the time you read this, the U.S. men's national team will have most likely completed its opening 2018 World Cup qualifier against St. Vincent and the Grenadines, winning handily. If that hasn't happened, USA coach Jurgen Klinsmann should be fired immediately. In fact, he should be fired immediately if the game is even the slightest bit in doubt beyond the first half. Why? Well, for one thing, it gets a lot tougher from here. For example: the team heads to Trinidad & Tobago on Tuesday, which is itself no pushover-just ask arch rival Mexico, which failed to beat T&T …

In which direction is Spain headed? Did a three-and-out showing at the World Cup last summer portend a bleak future or was it just a blip to be expected by the nation that captured its first World Cup in between back-to-back European crowns?

During the 2006 World Cup, German media often reported on the VIPs with: "German Chancellor Angela Merkel, German President Horst Koehler and Franz Beckenbauer attended last night's game."

The future FC Barcelona- and indeed, Spain's La Liga-hangs in the balance after Catalonia's regional parliament on Monday voted in favor of beginning the process of formally breaking away from Spain. According to the legislation, drafted in Catalan and backed by the region's two pro-separatist movements, Together for Yes and the Popular Unity Candidacy (CUP) party, Catalonia aims to become a completely separate country and state by 2017.

Cristiano Ronaldo has been talking an awful lot recently. Of course, that's probably because the new movie about his life- simply and aptly titled Ronaldo-debuts in theaters on Monday. Now, Off The Post has not yet seen the latest project from the Real Madrid superstar, but you can hazard a guess that the film will be an enormous panegyric to himself-and by extension, narcissism.

Real Madrid star Cristiano Ronaldo, in advance of the release of a film about his life on Monday, talked to the BBC about his career, his accomplishments, and the debate over whether he or Lionel Messi is currently the best player in the world.