WHO DESERVES TO BE CROWNED AFRICA'S BEST?

The race to be crowned Africa’s Best Footballer under the year in review, January 2010 to November 2010 will be very keen for a lot of reasons. The front runners include Ghana and Sunderland striker “Baby Jet” Asamoah Gyan, Cameroun and Inter Milan forward Samuel Eto’o Fils and Ivory Coast and Chelsea hitman Didier Drogba. The others are Seydou Keita (Mali and FC Barcelona), Ahmed Hassan (Egypt and Al Ahly), Salomon Kalou (Ivory Coast and Chelsea), Mohammed Nagy “Gedo” (Egypt and Al Ahly) and Madjid Bougherra (Algeria and Rangers). The two other strong Ghanaian interests are Andre “Dede” Ayew of French outfit Olympique Marseille and Kevin Prince Boateng of Italian giants AC Milan.

Admittedly, almost all these players are well cut out for the award because they have distinguished themselves quite creditably in their chosen careers for club and country within the year in retrospect. But since CAF announced the nominees, all and sundry in the football world especially in Africa has shared an opinion as to which direction it should go. It is in this same vein that a cross-section of soccer loving Ghanaians have also commented on this very subject. Judging from the arguments thus far, it looks like many are of the opinion Asamoah Gyan should get the crown this year.

Even though at first I dissented with those clamouring for the “Baby Jet”, I am now tempted to side with them after a careful analysis. Asamoah Gyan has been in tremendous form since the turn of the year for both club and country. Gyan led a youthful but inspired Black Stars to second place at the Angola 2010 Africa Cup of Nations scoring three goals in the process after the team was ravaged by injuries. He replicated the same form and even did better at the first Africa FIFA World Cup held in the rainbow nation of South Africa. Gyan carried the aspirations of the entire continent on his thin shoulders when almost single handedly he led the stars to a semi final berth but for a penalty miss against South American opponents Uruguay, as the sole flagbearers of Africa, after the other representatives were booted out in the group stages.

At club level, Gyan was fantastic for French side Stade Rennes after scoring 13 goals in a number of Ligue 1 appearances just before appending his signature to Premiership outfit Sunderland's record £13 million switch. At Sunderland, the star striker could least be said to be phenomenal as he has so far bagged 6 goals with as many as 5 in the Premiership and could even be an outside contender for the top scorer in arguably the best League in the world - The English Premiership.

In a year where the other hot favourites in the shape of Drogba and Eto’o will show for is only at the club level, Gyan has both the club and country laurels. Whilst Drogba helped Chelsea to reclaim the Premiership diadem from rivals Manchester United and also grabbed a personal achievement by winning the Premiership Top Scorer Award, Eto’o helped Internazionale Milan to win a treble-the UEFA Champions League, the Italian League and the Italian FA Cup. It is a fact however that the trio has all received Ballon d’Or nominations but when it stretched down to the wire, Gyan will no doubt receive the highest votes from coaches and players who are supposed to cast their ballot.

From an objective rather than patriotic point of view, this year belongs to Asamoah Gyan. You can love or loathe him but he has worked tirelessly this year especially for Ghana and so deserves the accolade much more than any African playing the globular leather we all call football.