Nigeria ‘Super Eagles’ teenage sensation John Obi Mikel has won the 2005 African Young Player of the Year award, just beating fellow Nigerian Taye Taiwo to the award with 29 votes to 28.

The 18-year-old central midfielder, who has been touted as one of the best young talents in the world, currently plays his club football in Norway for F.C. Lyn Oslo.

Mikel was rewarded by the CAF for his outstanding displays for as Nigeria finished runners-up at last year's World Youth Championship in Holland.

He had an excellent tournament as Nigeria reached the final, where they were unlucky to lose 2-1 to Argentina. Mikel won the silver ball after being voted the tournament's second best player.

Mikel made his senior debut for Nigeria's in August 2005, when he came on as a second-half substitute in a 1-0 friendly win over Libya.

He wasn’t called on to play again for the national team prior to being named in the Super Eagles squad for the 2006 African Cup of Nations.

In Nigeria's first group game, against Ghana, Mikel was an unused substitute. However, in the second match against Zimbabwe Mikel was substituted early in the second half and showed his talent.

Within ten minutes of coming on, he had supplied both the corner that resulted in Christian Obodo heading in the game's opening goal, and scored Nigeria's second goal.

He made his first senior international start in Nigeria's final group game,in their 2-1 victory over Senegal.

Bookmark/Search this post with:

delicious | digg | google | yahoo | technorati