The Ballon d'Or chaos you may have missed including winner 'leaks', an angry photographer incident and why fans yelled

The Ballon d'Or chaos you may have missed including winner 'leaks', an angry photographer incident and why fans yelled originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

At the 2026 Ballon d'Or ceremony on Monday evening, Harry Kane was crowned as this year's best player in the world, a remarkable achievement for the 33-year-old who scored the most goals of any player across Europe during the 2025/26 season.

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With the ceremony held at the Palladium Theatre in London, the first time it had ever been awarded outside France, Kane was on his home turf and in familiar territory.

The England star was emotional as he gave his speech on stage while accepting his award, in a moment of triumph in front of a global audience.

However, leading up to that point were several chaotic moments that earmarked a haphazard run-up to the big moment at the end of the gala.

MORE:Recap the evening's events at the 2026 Ballon d'Or gala

Ballon d'Or website mistakenly publishes stories prepared for winners

A few hours before the ceremony was scheduled to begin, mysterious links on the Ballon d'Or website began to surface online.

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It seemed that an article, mistakenly published earlier than intended, had "leaked" that Harry Kane had won the Ballon d'Or long before the ceremony took place. But then, others seemed to uncover similar articles that claimed Lamine Yamal and Kylian Mbappe had won.

So what was going on? In the end, it seemed that the content team at the Ballon d'Or had prepared articles for all three frontrunners, and had accidentally published all of them, leading to mass confusion. Eventually, all three articles were taken down, but it did take some time.

MORE:Why Harry Kane won the 2026 Ballon d'Or award over Lamine Yamal and Kylian Mbappe

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Angry photographer snaps at Fabrizio Romano live on air

As the global broadcasters of the Ballon d'Or ceremony, DAZN brought in a knowledgable commentary team to tackle the red carpet as current and former players streamed into the London venue in the hours before the gala began.

As the favorites began to arrive, the crew of Ade Oladipo, Lianne Sanderson, and Fabrizio Romano as hosts and analysts, plus Guillem Balague roaming the red carpet.

It wasn't long before Kylian Mbappe and Harry Kane arrived, with Kane even stopping by the crew for a chat, but it took Lamine Yamal a bit longer to arrive. Once he finally made it, he walked close behind the DAZN crew, with a huge crowd of photographers, paparazzi, media, and many others trailing his Barcelona entourage.

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One photographer who was completely lost and unaware of his surroundings barged through the DAZN set while they were live on the air, and Romano attempted to redirect him back behind the other analysts who he had walked in front of. The photographer seemed to initially oblige, and then inexplicably stops again. Romano again tried to usher him off camera, and the photographer snapped, shouting "stop grabbing me!" at Romano, which was picked up clearly on the microphones of the analysts.

Moments later, the unaware photographer was swarmed by DAZN executives and directed off, and the show awkwardly continued.

Ceremony delayed 45 minutes due to London traffic

The start of the Ballon d'Or ceremony was meant to begin at 8 p.m. local time, but that blew by without any indication of the event getting under way.

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France Football announced that the start of the event would be pushed back 30 minutes, as traffic in London was holding up the arrival of several key attendees, including those from Barcelona like Lamine Yamal.

Later, the ceremony was again delayed by another 15 minutes, and finally started at 8:45 p.m. local time. It would run for over two hours, finally concluding around 11:05 p.m. local time in London (7:05 p.m. ET).

Boisterous crowd repeatedly yells, boos during ceremony

In 2026, the Ballon d'Or gala was held outside France for the first time ever, in the 70th year of its existence.

The crowd has often been boisterous in Paris in recent years, especially as French giants PSG have risen to prominence.

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However, nothing has been like what it was in London, where the crowd was vociferous, often obnoxious. The yelling, cheering, heckling, and jeering repeatedly caused hosts Kate Scott and Thierry Henry to pause, stutter, or speak louder to cover up the obnoxious interruptions. As the ceremony dragged on, the jeering got louder and louder, repeatedly interrupting the presentations.

For the most part, the yelling was largely positive in support of the hometown hero Harry Kane, but on a few occasions, it turned sour. Every time Scott attempted to throw to a commercial break — which they often did in the middle of announcing a particular award — the crowd loudly booed the announcement, which was openly visible on the broadcast.

There were also a few notable crowd disturbances. Manchester United reporter Nathan Salt, who was in attendance, also posted online about one particular foul-mouthed argument in the media section.