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John Mikel Obi believes he should have been the recipient of the 2013 African Player of the Year not Yaya Toure
Nigeria and Chelsea icon John Mikel Obi has recently revealed that he felt robbed after losing out on the 2013 African Player of the Year to Yaya Toure, who was at Manchester City at the time.
Mikel believes he was robbed by CAF
Mikel was one of the front runners for the 2013 award after helping Chelsea to a Europa League win and winning the Africa Cup of Nations with Nigeria, but the honour eventually went to Yaya Toure who helped Manchester City to a runners-up spot in the FA Cup.
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In a recent interview with Dubai eye 103.8 Sports radio, Mikel says he believed that he was deserving of the award after his stellar year, but was robbed and deceived.
He claims that he was told by organisers that he had won the award to get him to travel for the award ceremony, but later found out that the award would be going to Yaya Toure after the Ivorian put in a stellar performance in one game just before the award ceremony.
“I was robbed mate. Before I went, I was told that I won it. I was at the airport flying to Nigeria, because the ceremony was in Nigeria, and guess what happened? Manchester City was playing, and Yaya scored a hat-trick or two goals.”
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Mikel could not believe his stellar year was not enough to win him the African POTY award
Mikel bemoaned his ill luck, counting the trophies he had helped Chelsea and Nigeria secure in the year prior to the ceremony,
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“I won the Nations Cup and the Europa League, and the year before that, I won the Champions League [and was] man of the match in the final. I was in my prime playing lots of games at that period as well, so you couldn’t say I wasn’t playing” Mikel added before talking about the effects his not winning the 2013 African POTY award had on the ceremony.
“You could have seen the ceremony. Before it [the award] was announced, everybody left the stage.”
Mikel’s exasperation does not seem unwarranted, as he eventually never went on to win the award after being denied the honour in one of the best trophy runs by an African player in a calendar year, while Yaya Toure, who won his third in 2013 went on to win the award a fourth award in 2014.
Mikel’s 2013 snub also meant that Nigeria would continue waiting on an African Player of the Year award winner after last seeing the award go to a Nigerian in 1999. The wait still continues today.
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