Eto’o Underdog For Fifa Award
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| Eto’o Underdog For Fifa Award | ||||||
| Zurich - December 19,, 2005 | ||||||
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Cameroon’s Samuel Eto’o will head to the stage at the Zurich Opera House tonight (Monday) as one of the three candidates for Fifa’s World Footballer of the Year award. The Barcelona striker is the underdog in the trio of candidates for the accolade, now regarded as the ultimate individual honour in the game. Eto’o, who has won the African Footballer of the Year award over the last two years, is up against his teammate Ronaldinho and the English midfielder Frank Lampard. The Brazilian Ronaldinho won the Fifa award last year and just last month added the prestige European Footballer of the Year award to his growing collection of accolades. |
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Eto’o is seeking to become only the second African to win the award after Liberia’s George Weah. The nomination was based on his goal scoring spree for Barcelona who won the Spanish league title last season and were convincing in the recent group phase of the Uefa Champions League, where they easily qualified for the knockout phase in February. The award is based on votes by national team coaches and captains from around the world. Only France's Zinedine Zidane (1998 and 2003) and Brazilian Ronaldo (1996, 1997 and 2002) have won the award more than once, since the vote was introduced in 1991. Ronaldinho’s status as favourite is enhanced by the fact that seven players have won both the world and European award in the same year - Marco Van Basten, Roberto Baggio, George Weah, Ronaldo, Zidane and Rivaldo. | ||||||
