Harry Kane wins the Ballon d'Or. Will Britain make him wait for a knighthood?
Harry Kane won the Ballon d'Or on 26 October. Downing Street praised him but would not say if he will be knighted in the New Year Honours.
What happened
Downing Street praised Harry Kane’s extraordinary achievement after he won the Ballon d’Or, but said it would not pre-empt the honours process when asked about a knighthood.
In Britain, the prime minister does not hand out knighthoods. An honours committee decides who gets an honour and which one. Its choices go to the Prime Minister and then to the King. Anyone can put a name forward, and GOV.UK says people may hear nothing back for 12 to 18 months.
Whether someone gets an honour - and the honour they get - is decided by an honours committee.
GOV.UK
Harry Kane won the Ballon d’Or on at the London Palladium. It is the top prize for a single football player, and Kane is the first Englishman to win it since Michael Owen in 2001. He is 33, captains England and plays for Bayern Munich.
On a spokesperson for Prime Minister Andy Burnham called the win an “extraordinary achievement“. Asked about a knighthood, she said “as ever, I’m not going to pre-empt the honours process“, so she would not speak before the committee decides. She also hoped for a trophy with England “before too long“. The Guardian links this to Euro 2028, which England will host with Scotland, Wales and Ireland.
Kane already has an MBE, a lower honour, from 2018, after England reached the World Cup semi-finals. The Guardian notes that footballers are often knighted only after they stop playing. David Beckham and Gareth Southgate were both knighted last year.
In July, Liberal Democrat MP Layla Moran put forward a motion in Parliament on a knighthood for Kane. Five MPs had backed it by , but such a motion does not have to be debated. The last New Year Honours list came out on , and the next one is due at the end of December.
Sources: theguardian.com
The Pattern
We looked for cases where a British sports star who was still competing won the top prize of their sport for the first time, and already had a lower honour such as an MBE. We then checked the next main honours list. We found five such wins from 2012 to 2024. Two of them, David Weir and Jessica Ennis, came in the same list of .
Show the other 3 cases
The Read
In all five times, the next list brought no knighthood or damehood. In the Cabinet Office, which organises the honours, was asked why David Weir was left out. It said the committee looks at whether a star is still competing and has a good chance of more wins, “otherwise there’s a difficulty that the committee would have nowhere else to go“. Andy Murray was knighted after his second Wimbledon, and Jessica Ennis became a dame four years after her gold. Kane is still playing, and Downing Street itself points to a trophy with England.
There are reasons for doubt. The same honours committee made every one of these choices, and none of the five stars was a footballer. Stars who had won before were often knighted at once. Bradley Wiggins and Ben Ainslie were knighted in after winning Olympic gold again, and Murray was knighted in the list right after his second Wimbledon in 2016. Alfie Hewett’s 2024 Wimbledon was his first, but he already had eight other big singles titles. The next list also comes about 65 days after Kane’s win, sooner than for any of the five, and football had two new knights in 2025.
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