Mohamed Salah Beaten to Prestigious Award in Ballon d’Or Reversal

The latest African Footballer of the Year has been named by CAF.

Mohamed Salah has been overlooked. / Visionhaus/Getty Images

Liverpool superstar Mohamed Salah has surprisingly been beaten to the 2025 African Footballer of the Year prize, despite being the continent’s highest-ranked player in the recent Ballon d’Or vote.

Instead, the latest annual CAF award has gone to Paris Saint-Germain full back Achraf Hakimi.

Fellow Moroccan Ghizlane Chebbak picked up the women’s prize, having top scored at the delayed 2024 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations this year, helping her team finish as runners-up.

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Salah had one of the all-time great individual seasons in English football in 2024–25. The “Egyptian King” racked up 29 Premier League goals and a further 18 assists in 38 appearances, spearheading Liverpool’s march towards only a second title in 35 years.

But the Reds fell short in both domestic cup competitions, while Champions League elimination came disappointingly early at the round of 16 stage at the hands of Hakimi’s PSG.

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Still, Salah was voted into fourth place for the 2025 Ballon d’Or in September, behind only Ousmane Dembélé, Lamine Yamal and Vitinha. Barcelona’s Raphinha was next, with Hakimi in sixth place.

The former Real Madrid and Borussia Dortmund defender had the best season of his career in 2024–25, playing 55 times across competitions as PSG completed a Ligue 1, Couple de France and Champions League treble, finally getting their hands on the elusive European trophy.

Hakimi’s 11 goals made it his most prolific campaign ever, with 16 assists on top giving him a direct goal involvement in virtually every other game.

Clearly, CAF voters valued Hakimi’s 2024–25 higher than Salah’s, with Champions League glory likely the swinging factor.

On stage receiving his award, the Madrid-born player raised in a Moroccan household said: “It’s really an honour for me to win this prestigious trophy. This trophy is not just for me—it is for all the Africans that have dreams.”

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African Footballer of the Year Winners in the 20th Century

Year	Player	Club	Country
2000	Patrick Mboma	Parma	Cameroon
2001	El Hadji Diouf	Lens	Senegal
2002	El Hadji Diouf	Liverpool	Senegal
2003	Samuel Eto’o	Mallorca	Cameroon
2004	Samuel Eto’o	Barcelona	Cameroon
2005	Samuel Eto’o	Barcelona	Cameroon
2006	Didier Drogba	Chelsea	Ivory Coast
2007	Frédéric Kanouté	Sevilla	Mali
2008	Emmanuel Adebayor	Arsenal	Togo
2009	Didier Drogba	Chelsea	Ivory Coast
2010	Samuel Eto’o	Inter	Cameroon
2011	Yaya Touré	Man City	Ivory Coast
2012	Yaya Touré	Man City	Ivory Coast
2013	Yaya Touré	Man City	Ivory Coast
2014	Yaya Touré	Man City	Ivory Coast
2015	Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang	Borussia Dortmund	Gabon
2016	Riyad Mahrez	Leicester City	Algeria
2017	Mohamed Salah	Liverpool	Egypt
2018	Mohamed Salah	Liverpool	Egypt
2019	Sadio Mané	Liverpool	Senegal
2020	no award	n/a	n/a
2021	no award	n/a	n/a
2022	Sadio Mané	Bayern Munich	Senegal
2023	Victor Osimhen	Napoli	Nigeria
2024	Ademola Lookman	Atalanta	Nigeria
2025	Achraf Hakimi	Paris Saint-Germain	Morocco

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Salah Blamed for Florian Wirtz’s Liverpool Struggles

Salah is yet to click with Florian Wirtz. / Catherine Ivill/AMA/Getty Images

It’s been a doubly tough week for Salah, now crucified by one media report in Germany for apparently holding back £116 million ($151.8 million) summer signing Florian Wirtz.

Wirtz, who starred away from the Liverpool spotlight in Germany’s 6–0 win over Slovakia to secure automatic World Cup qualification, has found it hard since moving to Anfield from Bayer Leverkusen. So far, the 22-year-old has been a shadow of the player he was in the Bundesliga and was even branded a “little boy” by Gary Neville following a recent defeat to Manchester City.

Liverpool have tried to integrate eight new faces at a combined cost in excess of £400 million into a title-winning team all at once. Wirtz isn’t the only one to sink rather than swim and a damning assessment from German publication Sport Bild brazenly claims that Salah is a “major problem” because he’s holding onto his alpha status within the team, actively prioritising more long-term teammates, and refusing to relinquish any of that to Wirtz.

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“It’s noticeable that he’s overlooked Wirtz and hasn’t made any of the other summer signings, who together cost around half a billion euros, shine,” Sport Bild writes of Salah.

“Salah has provided three assists this season, all of which led to goals, all for players who have been with the club longer. Salah is increasingly becoming a major problem for Liverpool and Wirtz. He is the king of the champions, seemingly blocking their successful new beginning. And thus, the future of his successor as the attacking leader: Wirtz.”

The impassioned piece goes on to suggest there is “no doubt” that Wirtz is “intended to be the leader of the future” for Liverpool, and also posits that Salah could head to Saudi Arabia next summer, only halfway through the new two-year contract he signed with the Reds a few months ago.

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