N'Golo Kante wins PFA Player of the Year

Duck Soup

N'Golo Kante has won the Professional Footballers' Association Player of the Year award for 2016-17.

The Chelsea midfielder, 26, beat Eden Hazard, Harry Kane, Romelu Lukaku, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Alexis Sanchez in the vote by his fellow players.

Tottenham's Dele Alli won the young player prize for the second successive year. Manchester City's Lucy Bronze won the Women's Player of the Year award.

Birmingham's Jess Carter was named Women's Young Player of the Year.

Former England captain David Beckham received the PFA's Merit award for his contribution to the game during the ceremony at the Grosvenor Hotel in London on Sunday.

Former England women's captain Kelly Smith - who became England's first female professional footballer when she joined American side New Jersey in 1999 - landed the PFA Special Achievement award.

http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/39686272

Barr

Fully deserved for Kante , he was a popular winner by the looks of it.

Zaph

Although a little overshadowed by Mahrez and Vardy, he was hugely instrumental in helping Leicester win the league last year, and it looks like he could be doing the same again this year at Chelsea. Definitely the outstanding player of the year and a worthy winner of the award.

Comic Book Guy

Deserving winner.

Do the voting % be released at any stage? Would just be interested to know how close it was or wasn't.

Lukker-

Comic Book Guy wrote: »

Deserving winner.

Do the voting % be released at any stage? Would just be interested to know how close it was or wasn't.

Not sure but I've read that he won by a fair margin.

Congrats to Kante

Hazard lost out as you cannot share the award with Herrera

keeponhurling

Obligatory comment about how it's ridiculous this award is given now, with quite a lot of the title race still to come

And of course the voting done even earlier.

Zaph

keeponhurling wrote: »

Obligatory comment about how it's ridiculous this award is given now, with quite a lot of the title race still to come

And of course the voting done even earlier.

I agree, but tbh I don't think it would have made any difference to the final outcome this season.

Kerrigooney

Totally deserved. The guy is a joy to watch.

chicorytip

Kerrigooney wrote:

Totally deserved. The guy is a joy to watch.

Why?? He runs around a lot but he is certainly not a footballer in the truest sense of the word. Any one of the other nominated candidates would have made a more deserving winner.

GavRedKing

chicorytip wrote: »

Why?? He runs around a lot but he is certainly not a footballer in the truest sense of the word. Any one of the other nominated candidates would have made a more deserving winner.

If it was that easy there'd be a lot more professionals playing at the highest level.

Lukker-

chicorytip wrote: »

Why?? He runs around a lot but he is certainly not a footballer in the truest sense of the word. Any one of the other nominated candidates would have made a more deserving winner.

You should write letter to Chelsea and tell them he's not actually a footballer but an imposter.

redzerdrog

You can tell how deserved it is by the lack of posts in this thread

keeponhurling

Zaph wrote: »

I agree, but tbh I don't think it would have made any difference to the final outcome this season.

Maybe but there is a still a way to go.

What if Kane's goals in the last 6 matches fire Spurs to the title?

Anyways, not likely to change

LuckyLloyd

The most impressive and most impactful player of the season won the award. What's rare is wonderful I guess.

bucketybuck

Most impactful?

Everybody loves Kante and all that, but he is not the reason Chelsea are going to win the league.

If Chelsea had not signed him, if Conte had bagged some other midfielder last summer, I don't think its some crazy to suggest they still would have been title contenders this season...

LuckyLloyd

Title Contenders? Sure. Title winners? I don't know about that. When I watch Chelsea he's the bedrock upon which it all functions. Much like he was the cornerstone of Leicester's title winning effort last year.

pjohnson

chicorytip wrote: »

Why?? He runs around a lot but he is certainly not a footballer in the truest sense of the word. Any one of the other nominated candidates would have made a more deserving winner.

"Not a footballer" "runs around a lot"

I think this explains just why he won

bucketybuck

LuckyLloyd wrote: »

Title Contenders? Sure. Title winners? I don't know about that. When I watch Chelsea he's the bedrock upon which it all functions. Much like he was the cornerstone of Leicester's title winning effort last year.

You are talking about a group of players that without N'Golo Kante...won the Premier league title.

LuckyLloyd

bucketybuck wrote: »

You are talking about a group of players that without N'Golo Kante...won the Premier league title.

With differences in their staring XI and squad; and a very different manager.