Tough choice for Player of the Year

JOHANNESBURG. - Africa will crown its best soccer player tomorrow but the electors have a tough choice in deciding between the three candidates for the 2017 African Footballer of the Year award.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang of Borussia Dortmund and Gabon goes up against Liverpool’s Senegalese Sadio Mane and Egyptian Mohamed Salah with none of the final three candidates having a defining achievement over the last 12 months to set them apart.

The winner will be announced at the annual Confederation of African Football awards being hosted in Accra, Ghana.

Aubameyang, who was the African Footballer of the Year in 2015 and runner-up in the last poll to Riyad Mahrez, finished as top scorer in the Bundesliga last season, netting 31 goals, and continued his form in front of goal into the new campaign.

He also scored the winner in the German Cup final in May but that is hardly likely to resonate with the voters, who are the national team coaches and captains from each African country plus a selected panel of journalists.

At national team level, the 28-yearold Aubameyang made little impression at the African Nations Cup finals in his home country at the start of 2017 and then missed most of Gabon’s unsuccessful World Cup qualifying campaign, citing transfer negotiations among the reasons for his absences. - Reuters.