Football News: Didier Drogba nominated for the African player of the year award
Didier Drogba, the man who led the goal scoring charts for Chelsea in the English Premier League last season and the footballer who led Ivory Coast in the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa has been selected as one of the nominees for
the African footballer of the year award for the year 2010. Drogba is one of the three players that have been selected from the English Premier League by the African football federation. Chelsea’s striker Solomon Kalou who has played an important role for
his club side as a substitute has been selected alongside his national team captain.
Ghana’s striker, Asamoah Gyan has also been nominated for the prestigious award. Gyan was the hero for Ghana in the 2010 World Cup in South Africa but he also unfortunately was also transformed into a villain for his national side when
he missed a crucial penalty, a spot kick which could have sent Ghana into the semi-finals of the World Cup. Nonetheless, Gyan made his 13 million pound move from Lens to Sunderland in the English Premier League in the summer. Other nominees include, Samuel
Eto’o from the present European champions, Inter Milan. Seydou Keita has also been nominated as he hails from the African state of Mali.
On 11th of December 2010, the list of nominees will be narrowed down to just three footballers before the final announcement of the winner of the award is announced in Egypt’s capital city of Cairo on 20th of
December, 2010. Winner of the award will be selected by a voting process conducted by Confederation of African football, where 53 national team coaches vote for the best African player of the year. The footballer who obtains the largest number of votes is
crowned as Africa’s best footballer eventually.
If Didier Drogba wins the award, he will join Samuel Eto’o as the only African footballer to have won the award in question, three times in totality. Drogba won the same award in 2006 when he fought off competition from Michael Essien
and Kolo Toure. Awards such as the African young player of the year will also be handed out in Egypt, players such as Ryad Boudebouz from Algeria and Moussa Maazou from Niger are in contention to win.
There are also other awards such as the African national team of the year, a label that the likes of Algeria, Ghana and Egypt are keen to gather.
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