10 players who missed out on the 23-man shortlist for the Ballon d'Or 2014

The 23-man list for the 2014 Ballon d’Or was announced recently. Most of the players who are there were expected to be there, but there were some notable absentees from the list which surprised a lot of people. With a lot of prestige and honour at stake, these nominations mean a lot to the players, especially in a World Cup year.Here is a list of 10 players who were expected to qualify but missed out on being shortlisted for the highest individual honour in World football. 

#10 Daniel Sturridge

Along with Luis Suarez, another surprise exclusion from the list, was Liverpool’s Daniel Sturridge. He was just as instrumental as Suarez in determining Liverpool's success last season. 

He always posed a threat going forward and scored a lot of goals for Liverpool last season. Suarez and Sturridge were considered to be one of the top striker duos in Europe last season because of the amount of goals and the threat they posed to other teams. Sturridge’s absence due to injury is definitely being felt right now as Liverpool have been in some sort of a rut this season.

Sturridge was on target in the World Cup as well for a disappointing England side, as he scored one of the two goals they managed in the tournament – his goal coming against Italy.