Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s Case for African Player of the Year
By John Harbeck
News out of ESPN today has stated that Borussia Dortmund super striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is still among the elite company being considered for the African Player of the Year award.
Aubameyang joins two Premier League stars, Riyad Mahrez of title-winning Leicester City and Liverpool winger Sadio Mane in the final three. Aubameyang is looking to win the away in back-to-back years following his triumph a year ago.
By nearly any measure, Aubameyang has filled out a more impressive statistical case this season and against better competition. A season ago, the Gabonese striker scored a Bundesliga goal every 99 minutes, while this season that scoring rate has fallen to a goal every 84 minutes of Bundesliga action.
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On top of that increased scoring, Aubameyang has stared in Champions League opposed to the Europa League. Of Borussia Dortmund’s six Champions League group stage matches, Aubameyang scored in five of them, including the two against Real Madrid. The only match that he left without scoring was the second match against Legia Warsaw in the 8-4 BVB victory.
I know Mahrez has the sexier storyline with the Leicester City magical victory, but he wasn’t even the best player in that Leicester City squad. That honor has to be awarded to N’Golo Kante who’s impact perhaps wasn’t fully felt until he left and when to Chelsea. A quick look at Leicester City (who still has Mahrez) and you see they are in 15th while Kante’s new club is still in first.
Mane has also been a fun story in the early part of this season, terrorizing Premier League backlines for Liverpool. He is perhaps their most important player, but the fact is his body of work is incomplete.
Has Mane been the star in a high profile match? Has he spent a full calendar year compiling superstar stats? The answer to both of those is no. His biggest match probably came to start the Premier League season against Arsenal with Mane chipping in a single goal. Outside of that, Mane hasn’t scored in a European competition, hasn’t led Liverpool to a top four finish either. I’m not saying that Mane wouldn’t be deserving if he continued this fine form for an entire year and led Liverpool to a top four finish. Just the body of work isn’t there yet.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, on the other hand, has a complete, full resume without any holes. A year ago, he led Borussia Dortmund to a second-placed finish in the Bundesliga and this season he has scored seemingly all of the important goals for BVB while winning a Champions League group including Real Madrid. In the 1-0 win against Bayern Munich, who had the goal? In the 2-2 draw away against Real Madrid who scored and set up the other? In both cases it was Aubameyang.
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Put quite simply, these awards are perennially given out to whoever has the most impressive offensive output in a single year. Sure, Mane may have had some flashy moments and Mahrez won a title, but both lack the pure, packed resume of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.