Egypt and Liverpool star Mohamed Salah has been named the 2018 Aiteo African Player of the Year for a second successive time at a gala awards ceremony in Senegal Tuesday reports Completesports.com.
Salah will becomes the first player from the north of the continent to claim the title back-to-back.
Egypt forward Salah, 26, beat Liverpool team-mate Sadio Mane of Senegal and Arsenal and Gabon striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang to the title.
He received the award at a ceremony in Senegal on Tuesday.
“I have dreamt of winning this award since I was a child and now I have done so twice in a row,” Salah said.
Salah was also voted the BBC African Footballer of the Year for the second time in December.
He scored 44 goals for Liverpool during the 2017-18 season, helping the Reds to the Champions League final before scoring twice for Egypt at the World Cup in Russia.
He has scored 16 goals in 29 appearances across all competitions for Liverpool this season.
Houston Dash and South Africa forward Thembi Kgatlana was crowned the 2018 African Women Player of the Year prize.
The 22-year-old becomes the second South African to be named as Africa’s best after Noko Matlou beating three-time winner Asisat Oshoala and Francisca Ordega to the crown.
Bayana Bayana of South Africa’s coach Desiree Ellis won the African Women’s Coach of the Year while Hervé Renard was adjudged the men’s Coach of the Year.
Mauritania won the Men’s Team of the Year 2018. The Corentin Martins’ led side are one of the 14 countries to have qualified for the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations tournament billed for Egypt.
Nigeria’s Super Falcons won the Women’s Team of the Year 2018 by the Confederation of African Football, CAF. The Super Falcons won the 2018 Africa Womens Cup Of Nations tournament in Ghana for a record ninth time after beating South Africa 4-3 on penalties in the final.
Amaju Pinnick, president of the Nigeria Football Federation and first vice president of CAF received the award on behalf of the Super Falcons.
Fouzi Lekjaa was presented with the Tessema Award.
Achraf Hakimi beat Wilfred Ndidi and Frank Kessie to the African Youth Player of the Year award.
Meanwhile no Nigerian player made the CAF Africa Best X1.
The Africa Best XI include: Denis Onyango (Mamelodi Sundowns/Uganda), Serge Aurier (Tottenham/Ivory Coast), Medhi Benatia (Juventus/Morocco), Eric Bailly (Manchester United/Ivory Coast), Kalidou
Koulibaly (Napoli/Senegal); Naby Keita (Liverpool/Guinea), Thomas Partey (Atletico Madrid/Ghana), Riyad Mahrez (Manchester City/Algeria); Mohamed Salah (Liverpool/Egypt), Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang
(Arsenal/Gabon) and Sadio Mane (Liverpool/Senegal).
By Johnny Edward
5 Comments
Dennerby,Rohr,Oshoala and co don’t deserve any of these awards sincerely speaking if anyone Ndidi is the only one that lost out and Ordega whom also suffered as a result of their poor team performace during the Awcon! I hope 2019 our national team coaches and players will step up their team play and give us something to cheer about! Dennerby and Rohr should learn from the Manchester coach and play strong attacking football because this is what Nigeria is made off.
Na wa for you oo! Poor team performance yet Falcons are team of the year and won AWCON, while Eagles qualified for AFCON with a game to spare and were the only Africa can team that was just minutes away from qualifying for the knock out stages of the World Cup? If we were poor name one African country achieved more than us in 2018 on the actual field of play.
@Adisboy, I agree with @Chima. Falcon’s win at the last AWCON in Ghana is something that can be classified as a ‘Phyrric victory.’ Yes, they won the cup, but they had to fumble and wobble their way to the trophy, banking on the lottery of penalty shootouts in the semis and final. I think the Women’s Team of the Year was politics by CAF to compensate the team, as it would be awkward that the recent champions missed out on both the Team of the Year and CAF Woman Player of the Year awards.
What was really puzzling for me is the total blackout of SE players and even Rohr in the men’s category, including the CAF 11. It seems CAF was choosing players from the big teams in Europe. Otherwise I don’t see what Ghana’s Partey or Cote d’Ivoire’s Aurier are doing on that list, or how these 2 are better than Ndidi and Ekong. It’s just as John Ogu pointed out in the other news.
Ghana’s Partey is highly technical don’t even go close but as for bench warmers like Aurier and bailey and even Benita of Juve who’s 50-50 for me is highly debatable plus in inclusion of Naby who’s been struggling for appearance at Liverpool after an injury plague season in Germany a lot is shabby when we rate CAF 11 but in the end our players must do more to merit been chosen because as of today only Ndidi deserves a spot in CAF 11
@Kel and adisboy if you watched the Awcon tournament from beginning to End you will see what I’m talking about. Yes falcons won team of the year because they won the trophy but how was it won and why was Katlana female player of the year or why was Dessire Ellis coach of the year why not Asissat or Dennerby. When we are making comments let’s us be neutral so we tackle the real issues and stop be partial in our judgements because we are Nigerians. In that tournament South Africa and Cameroon outplayed us and experience on our players path was the only grace we had to win both games via penalties and for me our goal keeper should have won player of the year award or Onome Ebi but CAF choosing Katlana too was not a bad idea because she was a torn of flesh all through the tournament and was unlucky at the final not to have won it for SA. I am a very honest person regardless of where I come from that is why most times on this forum I support anyone’s view if deemed correct forgetting it is Drey Jones or Tayo because once I see a good view I like and comment same way I comment on bad views regardless of who it’s coming from.