Atalanta forward Ademola Lookman who is the top favourite to be named as the new Africa Player of the Year later today at the CAF Awards, OwnGoalNigeria.com reports.
The rise of Lookman as a top contender for the award is coming on the back of a splendid year for club and country, where he followed up an impressive performance for Nigeria at the AFCON with a hattrick in the 3-0 Europa League final win over Bayer Leverkusen.
Commenting on his rise to the top, Akinyele Kingsley a football intermediary says it all changed for the 27 year old when he decided to pledge his international future to Nigeria, after representing England at various youth levels including winning the U20 World Cup.
” Lookman was a journey man at some point in his career, but playing for Nigeria at senior level gave him the much needed tag of a senior international and it made it easy for Atalanta to take a gamble on him. Remember when he played for Nigeria he was surplus to requirements at RB Leipzig. He had two separate loan spells at some point”, he told OwnGoalNigeria.com.
” It is why I feel the duo of Tosin Adarabiyio and Carney Chukwuemeka are not helping their careers by not committing to Nigeria. As for Lesley Ugochuckwu anyone telling him he will play for France at senior level needs to be jailed because he is no where near the top ten in his position in the French setup”, he concluded.
