Argentina's Lionel Messi wins the Ballon d'Or for the third year in a row. [Source:Sina.com]

Lionel Messi, already judged one of football's all-time greats at 24, unsurprisingly extended his reign as the world's best player for a third consecutive year on Monday.

The Barcelona and Argentina forward beat Real Madrid's Cristiano Ronaldo and Barcelona team-mate Xavi to the prize.

"It's a huge pleasure for me," Messi said, after accepting the trophy from another three-times winner, the former Brazil forward Ronaldo. "It's the third time I get this award and it's a huge honour."

Messi received 47.88 percent of the points in votes cast by national team coaches and captains plus selected reporters. Cristiano Ronaldo finished second with 21.6 percent and Xavi got 9.23 percent to finish third for the third straight year.

The only other three-time winners are Ronaldo (1996-97 and 2002) and Zinedine Zidane (1998, 2000 and 2003). The FIFA award was renamed last year, when it merged with France Football's Golden Ball.

Messi's prolific scoring and unselfish creative play inspired Barcelona to win five trophies last season including the Champions League, Spanish League and Club World Cup.

On a night of Barcelona dominance, Barca's Pep Guardiola was chosen ahead of Madrid's Jose Mourinho and Manchester United's Alex Ferguson as the men's coach of the year.

Messi missed a second trophy presented for the year's most beautiful goal, chosen by fans who voted online from a shortlist of 10. The Brazil forward Neymar got the prize for a solo goal in Santos's 5-4 defeat against Flamengo in July.

Other awards went to Japan's women's World Cup-winning captain Homare Sawa for the women's player of the year, while the Japanese manager Norio Sasaki earned his coach of the year award for women's football.

The Japanese FA was also awarded the Fifa fair play award.

All three Ballon d'Or nominees were part of the 2011 all-star lineup chosen by the FIFPro group of players' unions comprising 50,000 members worldwide. They selected a team entirely of Barcelona, Madrid and Manchester United players:

Goalkeeper (Iker Casillas); defense (Dani Alves, Gerard Pique, Sergio Ramos, Nemanja Vidic); midfield (Xavi, Andres Iniesta, Xabi Alonso); forwards (Messi, Ronaldo, Rooney).