Edwin van der Sar, Wesley Sneijder and Arjen Robben have been nominated by their colleague players for this year’s world football squad. FIFA announced the 55 international players on the shortlist on Thursday, with ten of them coming from Spain.

The final selection of FIFA’s FIFPro World XI 2010 squad will be announced at a gala on 10 January, when the Golden Ball award for the world’s best footballer will also be awarded. Robben en Sneijder are on the shortlist for the top prize.

Other awards to be handed out at the gala will include the prize for the best goal, for which Robben and his Dutch colleague Giovanni van Bronckhorst have been nominated. The ‘Best trainer 2010’ will also be selected from a list which includes Dutch trainers Bert van Marwijk who heads the national squad and Louis van Gaal manager at Bayern Munich.

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