Leaks from the Confederation of African Football have revealed the final ranking of the continent’s best players, and Senegalese Sadio Mane, who recently moved from Liverpool to Bayern, received the award.
According to leaks reported by several press reports, Egyptian star Mohamed Salah lost the Ballon d’Or award to African best player Sadio Mane.
The reasons for Mohamed Salah’s loss of the Ballon d’Or in Africa, if the leaks are true, are due to the inability to achieve any results at the international level with the Egyptian national team.
Egypt led by Mohamed Salah lost the Africa Cup of Nations title to Senegal led by Sadio Mane in the final on penalties.
The Egyptian national team also lost the opportunity to reach the final of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, losing, in particular, to Senegal led by Mane.
At club level, Mohamed Salah won the same championships as his colleague Sadio Mane, given that both players played on the same team.
Thus, Mohamed Salah forfeited the award for reasons related to the results of the tournaments he participated in with his country, without taking into account the outstanding individual achievements he achieved with Liverpool.
The Egyptian star was named the Premier League Player of the Year for the second time in its history after winning it in 2018.
Mohamed Salah also achieved other individual titles during the season as he received the Liverpool Player of the Season award.
The Egyptian striker was top scorer in the Premier League for the third time alongside South Korean striker Heung-Min Son of Tottenham Hotspur.
The Liverpool striker also competed with his side in the English Premier League and European Champions League until the very last moment and managed to win both the League Cup and the FA Cup with Liverpool.
Mohamed Salah appeared in 51 games with the Reds last season, scoring 31 goals and providing 16 assists, becoming the Premier League’s top playmaker in addition to top scorer.
According to the leak, the list of nominees for the Continental Player of the Year award is as follows:
1- Senegalese Sadio Mane (Bayern)
2- Egyptian Mohamed Salah (Liverpool)
3- Senegalese Edward Mendy (Chelsea)
4- Algerian Riyad Mahrez (Manchester City)
5- Ivorian Sebastian Haller (Ajax)
6- Moroccan Ashraf Hakimi (Paris Saint-Germain)
7- Cameroonian Vincent Abubakar (Win)
8- Guinean Naby Keita (Liverpool)
9- Senegalese Kalidou Coulibaly (Naples)
10 Cameroonian Carl Toko Ekambi (Olympic Lyon).
The awards ceremony for the best on the continent for the last season (2021-2022) of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) will take place tomorrow, Thursday, in Morocco.
Source: “Egyptian media”