African players continue to exceed expectations as they continue to outperform counterparts in their various football clubs across Europe. According to a report by KPMG, there are currently over 500 African players playing in European leagues. If we were to factor in the number of players playing in Asia and the Middle East, those numbers are likely to double. However, majority of the African players playing in various leagues seem to originate from West African states. “Senegal, Morocco, and Nigeria produced the highest number of players in European leagues, with 62, 55 and 54 players respectively, as of Nov. 23, 2021. Other countries include Ivory Coast (50), Ghana (46), Algeria (32), Mali (32), Cameroon ((28), DR Congo (23) and Guinea (13), with west African states dominating the chart”, according to the KPMG Football Benchmark report.
We cannot but mention some of the football players like Rabah Madjer (Algeria), Mohamed Aboutrika (Egypt), Emmanuel Amuneke (Nigeria), Abedi Pele (Ghana), Thomas N’Kono (Cameroon), who broke the barriers that were set decades ago, which gave the following generations of players the belief that they could also play football at an international level.
Samuel Eto’o, Yaya Toure And Didier Drogba Are Africa’s Top Three Decorated Players
Cameroons Samuel Eto’o, and Ivory Coast’s Didier Drogba and Yaya Touré are Africa’s top three decorated African players with a total of 53 titles amongst them.
Samuel Eto’o played for top clubs like FC Barcelona, Inter Millan and Chelsea won 7 major titles with FC Barcelona some of which included La Liga, Champions League, Super Copa and Copa del Ray titles, 6 major titles with Inter Milan, 3 International cups with Cameroon and 1 with Espanyol.
Yaya Toure also bagged a total of 18 titles with clubs like Manchester City and Barcelona winning 8 titles with Manchester City, 7 with Barcelona, 2 with Olympiacos, 1 with another club and 1 International cup with Ivory Coast.
Didier Drogba won a total of 17 trophies, 14 of which he won playing for Chelsea FC and 3 playing with Turkish club Galatasaray.
Other Key Performers
Nwankwo Kanu is the fourth most decorated African player with 15 major titles, 6 of which came from his time at Arsenal FC and 6 at Ajax, 2 for Nigeria playing in international competitions, and 1 for Inter Milan.
Michael Essien placed fifth on this list with 13 major titles. 8 came from his time in Chelsea, 6 at Lyon FC and 1 from Bastia
Obi Mikel placed sixth on the list with a total of 12 trophies won. 11 of which came from his stay at Chelsea FC, and one international cup playing for Nigeria.
Conclusively, the future of African in Football looks bright with players like Mohammad Salah, Victor Osimhen and Sadio Mane doing excellently in Europe.
With more of these performances, it is only a matter of time before African countries and players bag more international awards, further placing Africa on the global map.
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