Cristiano Ronaldo is feeling the cold away from Madrid Ballon d'Or 2019 Missed out on the Ballon d'Or again

Monday night's Ballon d'Or ceremony brought an end to 2019's individual awards and Lionel Messi was the big winner on the night, for his sixth triumph.

Virgil van Dijk was second and behind the Dutchman came Cristiano Ronaldo, who was absent on the night.

The Portuguese has lost out this year. Beyond winning Serie A with Juventus, not that they struggled to do that before his arrival, and the Nations League with Portugal, he was left feeling something that a number of players have felt in the last decade.

Cristiano left Real Madrid looking for glory and happiness, but he's been left feeling cold away from the Spanish capital.

It's true that on the same evening he was named the best player in Serie A, but he'd have preferred to be in Paris over Milan and it's clear that Juventus haven't given him what he was looking for.

Just as he's struggled without Madrid, they've suffered without him. The No.7 was a reference for the club for the best part of a decade, but Zinedine Zidane does now seem to be, finally, steadying the ship.

Angel Di Maria, Mesut Ozil and even Gonzalo Higuain are other players to have left Madrid for sporting reasons, but none of them saw their careers project as planned either.

Di Maria has enjoyed himself at Paris Saint-Germain, but at a lower level than he'd have liked, Ozil's career has taken a sharp decline and Higuain has changed club four times without hitting the heights he expected to reach.

Cristiano Ronaldo is still among the best and nobody doubts that, but his Real Madrid exit has come at a cost.