All eyes on Lookman as CAF crowns Africa’s best footballers today

Super Eagles’ star, Ademola Lookman, has been tipped to succeed his compatriot, Victor Osimhen, as the African Footballer of the Year (men) when the Confederation of African Football (CAF) holds its awards gala at the Palais des Congres in the Moroccan city of Marrakech this evening.

Challenging Lookman for the crown are some of the continent’s best performers this year, including Guinea’s Serhou Guirassy, Cote d’Ivoire Simon Adingra, South Africa’s Romwen Williams and Morocco’s Achraf Hakimi.

Lookman’s three goals and two assists were pivotal to Nigeria reaching their eighth Africa Cup of Nations final in Cote d’Ivoire in February, and his hat-trick in a 3-0 win handed Italian side, Atalanta FC the UEFA Europa Cup at the expense of hitherto-rampaging German side, Bayer Leverkusen in May.

This season, he has notched 11 goals and five assists in 18 appearances in all competitions for Atalanta (including a goal against record winners Real Madrid FC in the UEFA Champions League), and scored two goals as Nigeria qualified for the 35th Africa Cup of Nations finals, with two other goals controversially chalked off.

None of the four other final nominees comes close. Ivorian Simon Adingra, whose remarkable second-half performance saw the Elephants overcome Nigeria in the AFCON final in Abidjan on February 11, cannot point to such a glittering record with English Premier League club, Brighton.

Incidentally, Nigeria and Cote d’Ivoire appear to always run neck-and-neck in continental titles. Both countries have three AFCON titles each, and have scooped the Men’s Player of the Year title six times since the awards were taken over by CAF in 1992. Cameroon lead with 11 titles (including Samuel Eto’O’s quadruple) dating back to 1970 when