Abbas Jimoh
4 February 2008
But for the media hype of the English Premier League; and the less pronounced Sevilla football club, the dethronement of Samuel Eto'o of Cameroon by Frederick Oumar Kanoute of Mali for the coveted Africa Footballer of the Year award would not have been a surprise.
Kanoute, 30, was named the 2007 African Footballer of the Year on Friday night at a ceremony in the Togolese capital, Lome.
Kanoute, is the first winner from Mali since Salif Keita won the inaugural award in 1970.
The Mali and Sevilla striker beat off competition from Didier Drogba (Ivory Coast and Chelsea) and Michael Essien (Ghana and Chelsea) to become the first European-born player to claim the award.
Other awards given in Lome went to the Ivory Coast as the African Team of the Year, while CAF Champions League win-ners Etoile du Sahel of Tunisia won Club of the Year. Etoile striker Armine Chermiti was named the Best African Club Competition Player and Zambian Clifford Mulenga claimed Young African Player of the Year.
"I dedicate this to my family, who could not be here, and to the people of Mali, I believe that sport can be used as a tool for development in Africa," he said after the award.
Fredi, born in Sainte-Foy-les-Lyon, France, began his career with hometown club Olympique Lyon. He played for France's Under-21 side, before switching his allegiances to Mali, the country of his father's birth, in 2004.
He scored in the Uefa Cup final wins against Middles-brough in 2006 and Espanyol in 2007, as well as the 3-0 victory over Barcelona in the European Super Cup at the start of last season.
He netted the winner as Sevilla beat Getafe 1-0 to win the King's Cup Final last June, and got a brilliant hat-trick against Real Madrid at the Bernabeu in a 6-3 aggregate victory in the Spanish Super Cup at the start of this season.
Kanouté's talents as a tall striker were first noticed by his local team, Olympique Lyonnais, which he joined as an apprentice in 1997. He played for the French under-21 team while at the club.
He joined English club, West Ham United, in 2000 and went on to play 84 times for the East London club, scoring 29 goals. His speed and awareness attracted interest from Totten-ham Hotspur who bought him at the end of the 2002-03 season.
Although eligible for either, Kanouté choose to play for Mali rather than for France. He was joint top goal scorer for Mali at the 2004 African Nations Cup; scoring 4 goals in 4 matches to help Mali to the Semifinals where they lost to Morocco.
Kanouté enjoyed mixed success at Tottenham, where he scored on his debut with an acrobatic volley, with occasio-nal flashes of brilliance marked by apparent pique when he preferred the African Nations Cup over the Premiership and went AWOL from Tottenham's 2005 summer tour to Mauritius.
He was sold to Sevilla on 17 August 2005 for €6.5m.
Kanouté's first games for Sevilla against Tottenham Hots-pur lead to him scoring a (some-what controversial) penalty at the Sanchez Pijuan in a game marred by crowd trouble, and an excellent goal at White Hart Lane, leaving the final aggregate score 4-3 to Sevilla.
He was a second half sub-stitute for the club in the UEFA Cup Final against Middles-brough and scored in the 89th minute to give Sevilla 4-0 win.
The 2006/2007 season has proved his most productive and has earned him much praise for the prominent role he has played in leading Sevilla's surprising charge on three fronts. Challen-ging for the Copa del Rey 2006/2007, where they played Getafe in the final, as well as the Uefa Cup and the La Liga have moved him into relatively unchartered territory as he had not expe-rienced such a combination of success and influence in the past.
The previous year's Uefa Cup had featured just a cameo appearance for him in a comfor-table victory, although he grabbed a late goal. Nonetheless, he secured his first honour of the season on the 16th May with Sevilla's victory over Espanyol on penalties, after a 2-2 draw set.
Kanoute had seemingly retained the title for Sevilla with his extra-time goal (his 4th of the tournament) to make it 2-1 but a late equalizer prompted penalties. Kanoute scored the first in a 3-1 penalty triumph.
Sevilla's title challenge ultimately unravelled and Real Madrid took the title, with Kanoute's side in third. Since the opening of the Summer transfer window he has been linked to a succession of clubs, and frequently to moves back to the English Premier League with Portsmouth, Bolton and Newcastle all interested. He is reportedly valued at around 7 million pounds.
In October 2007, Kanoute, along with Mali international teammate, Mamady Sidibe, were attacked by irate Togo fans after they knocked the country out of the African Nations Cup qualifier.
Kanoute failed to steer Mali into the Africa Cup of Nations quarter-finals, finishing third in Group B behind Nigeria and Ivory Coast.
He scored from the penalty spot in the opening 1-0 win over Benin, but then they drew 0-0 with Nigeria before losing 3-0 to Ivory Coast to bow out of the competition.
Kanouté has been a practi-sing Muslim from around the age of 20. This prompted his club, in the 2006/07 La Liga sea-son, to give him a brand-free jersey every match, because of the club's sponsor - 888.com, an internet gambling site - and gambling is against the principles of Islam.
The company, however, agreed to give some money to an Islamic charity in return for Kanouté wearing the sponso-red kit. He has splashed out more than 510,860 euros (749,340 dollars) to buy his own mosque in Spain.
The privately owned mosque was due to be sold after a contract to use the premises by the local Muslim population had expired. The Islamic Community of Spain confirmed that a last-minute appeal was made to Kanoute after the mosque had been put up for sale.
Most of Seville's Muslims who will benefit from Kanoute's gesture are immigrants from north and west Africa.
"The worshippers at Ponce De Leon are quite diverse but if it had not been for Kanoute then we would not have had a mosque on Fridays, which is the most holy day of the week for Muslims," a spokesman for the Islamic Community of Spain told the local paper Diario de Sevilla.
It is estimated that Kanoute has spent almost a year's salary to buy the mosque.
In 2006, he has launched an appeal to establish a 'Children's Village' in Mali
He has been linked to a return spelt of Tottenham; quoted as saying that his former coach, Juande Ramos, could tempt him back for a second spell at Tottenham Hotspur.
Kanoute for Ramos at Sevilla before the Spaniard left to take over the reins at Spurs.
"I like Ramos as a coach. He has been very good with me, and I like the way he works. If he asked me [about a return], I would have to think about it, because it is an important time in my career.
"At the moment I feel good about things at Sevilla, but we'll see. I would need to reflect a lot before taking any decision," Kanoute said.
This has however been put to seal by Sevilla president, Jose Maria del Nido, who has warned Ramos against returning with offers for Kanoute and Daniel Alves.
"Alves and Kanoute have a buy-out value of a reported £60m. I doubt very much that Tottenham have the money to buy them. Del Nido said.
The African Footballer of the Year award is voted for by the national coaches of the 53 CAF associations.
The award also makes a mockery of Fifa's process of selecting their World Player of the Year as Kanoute was not even considered by the Fifa panel as being in the world's top 50 players in 2007.
How then can one think that Kanoute does not deserve to be crowned the new king of African football?
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