Matildas and Chelsea ace Kerr left off FIFA shortlist for best player

Australian captain Sam Kerr has missed out on the three-strong shortlist as FIFA Best Women's Player of 2022, a surprising omission after her spectacular goal-laden year.

Widely regarded as the finest striker in the women's game, Kerr finished runner-up for last year's award, but this time has not even made it among the final trio - Spain's Alexia Putellas, England's Beth Mead and American Alex Morgan.

As Lionel Messi looked sure to lift the equivalent men's award from fellow finalists Kylian Mbappe and Karim Benzema, the Matildas and Chelsea ace Kerr may have been forgiven for wondering what she had to do to make the women's shortlist which was announced on Friday.

For while last year's winner Putellas was somewhat puzzlingly selected after missing much of the year through injury, Kerr never stopped scoring for club and country.

She was crowned English football's golden boot winner as top scorer while powering Chelsea to a domestic league and Cup double with spectacular strikes.

Mead, in the Euros, and Morgan, in the CONCACAF W championship, were rewarded for being players of the tournament in a continental event their national teams won.

So Kerr perhaps suffered because the Matildas didn't lift the Asian Cup - even though she was the tournament's leading goalscorer while also becoming Australia's all-time top scorer, man or woman.

With the shortlists being announced the day after Kerr had scored four goals in yet another big-match - Chelsea's League Cup semi-final at West Ham - it doubtless only fuelled the plentiful cries of injustice on social media, with fans suggesting the Australian had been "robbed".

The votes were cast by a global panel of national team captains and coaches, plus a selected journalist in each of FIFA's 211 member countries, as well as fans voting online.

The men's award, which will also be announced at a February 27 ceremony in Paris, looks set to be fought out between Argentina's Messi and France's Mbappe, just eight weeks after their epic duel in the World Cup final.

Of the two Paris St Germain teammates, Messi is odds-on favourite to land a seventh win in FIFA's annual individual prize.

Kerr and Lyon's Ellie Carpenter are poised to go head-to-head in the Women's Champions League after their powerhouse clubs were drawn against each other in the quarter-finals.

Champions Lyon, who last weekend welcomed Carpenter back into their side after her eight-month absence following a serious knee injury suffered in last year's final, represent a massive hurdle for fellow Australian international Kerr, who's after the one major trophy missing from her glittering Chelsea resume.

Matildas colleagues Caitlin Foord and Steph Catley will also feature in the last-eight for Arsenal, who were pitted against German giants Bayern Munich when the draw was made in Nyon, Switzerland, on Friday.

Both English clubs, Chelsea and Arsenal, have the advantage of playing the second legs of their ties at home after winning their groups.

But with the semi-final draw also having taken place on Friday, both Chelsea and Lyon have been plunged into the toughest section of the draw, with the winners probably set to face 2021 champions Barcelona, who will play Roma in the last-eight.

So, if in-form Kerr and her dominant Chelsea outfit get through, they could face a repeat of the 2021 final when they were hammered 4-0 by the Spanish champions in Gothenburg.

Barcelona lost last year's final 3-1 to Lyon, who lifted a record eighth Champions League crown despite it proving a bittersweet night for fullback Carpenter, who had to come off in the first quarter-of-an-hour with her ruptured ACL.

Should Arsenal win their quarter-final, they will play either French side PSG or Germany's Wolfsburg as they seek to earn a place in the final in Eindhoven, Netherlands, on June 3.