2014 AFC Player of the Year nominees announced

Kuala Lumpur: Al Hilal striker Nassir Al Shamrani, Al Ain ace Ismail Ahmed and 2006 AFC Player of the Year Qatar’s Khalfan Ibrahim have been nominated for the 2014 AFC Player of the Year award.

The AFC Annual Awards will be held in Manila, Philippines, on November 30 in conjunction with the AFC’s 60th anniversary celebrations.

None of the nominees has achieved anything of significance in Asian football this season or the one before.

The list is reflecting the poor standard of the Asian football players, as none of the finalist has any reputation in Asian let alone World Football. It also highlights the Arab influence in the AFC as the nominated players are all Arabs and none have exactly set the continent or even their domestic leagues alight. With the criteria for selection of players in AFC being a peculiar system of accumulating points in the AFC champions league match, the whole process loses authenticity and legitimacy.

When Asian players such as Shinji Kagawa , Makoto Hasebe,  Son Heung-Min and  Keisuke Honda who all play in the best leagues of the world against the best players yet a players  named Nassir Al Shamrani suddenly becomes a candidate for best Asian player, then all one can assume is that nominations process has a serious flaw and has very little to do with superior performance or excellence in Asian Football , but more like a ceremonial presentation for some players based on feeble foundation of  criterion.