New Delhi: Although favorites Argentina suffered an early exit from the FIFA World Cup in Russia, Lionel Messi remains atop among the Indian fans followed by Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo, who also exited in the pre-quarters after losing to Uruguay.
Croatia captain Luka Modric and England skipper Harry Kane take the third and fourth positions respectively, according to a survey released by the Indian Sports Fan, the country’s largest online sports fan community.
While Portugal and Argentina bowed out of the tournament in the round of 16, England went down to Croats in the semifinals.
According to the survey, the result is of 5,403 fan respondents in the age group of 13 to 47 years, who participated in the online fan poll from across the world. Restricted to Indian origin respondents only, the survey accounted for 23 per cent female and the remaining are male.
While Messi got an overwhelming support from the eastern and southern regions with 39 per cent votes, Ronaldo was a clear winner in the metropolitan cities accounting for 18 per cent votes.
Modric, one of the pillars of the Croatian success till now has 14 per cent votes to his name while Kane has got 10 per cent votes. Incidentally Kane is also in the running for the ‘Golden Boot’ award with six goals in the tournament. Brazil’s Neymar is at fifth with nine per cent votes.
Argentina have been voted as the best team with a staggering 47 per cent votes followed by Brazil at 27 per cent and France at 21.