UAE Pro League announces nominees for 2024-2025 season awards

The UAE Pro League has uncovered the nominees for its 2024-2025 season awards, across a variety of categories from The Golden Ball for Best Player, The Golden Boy for Best U23 Player, The Golden Glove for Best Goalkeeper, The Leader for Best Coach, Goal of the Year, and The Fans’ Player of the Year.

The UAE Pro League Awards ceremony will take place at Emirates Palace Mandarin Oriental. The awards are divided into three categories, namely the vote-based category, the statistics-based category, and the criteria-based award.

The Golden Ball for the Best Player sees strong contenders including Al Ain’s duo Laba Kodjo and Alejandro Romero, in addition to Shabab Al Ahli’s Sardar Azmoun, Federico Cartabia, Sharjah’s Firas Ben Arbi, Caio Lucas, Mehdi Ghayedi (Kalba), Omar Khribin (Al Wahda), Fabio Lima (Al Wasl), and Nabil Fekir (Al Jazira).

The Golden Boy Award for Best Player U23 highlights emerging talents such as Shabab Al Ahli’s Guilherme Da Silva, Renan Vicror Da Silva, as well as Marouan Azarkan (Al Nasr), Matías Palacios (Al Ain), Al Wahda’s Brahima Diarra, Rúben Canedo, Lithierry Silva (Ajman), Siaka Sidibe (Al Wasl), Guilherme Sucigan (Sharjah), and Mamadou Coulibaly (Al Jazira).

The Golden Glove Award for Best Goalkeeper sees top contenders such as Sultan Al Mantheri (Kalba), Hamad Al Meqbaali (Shabab Al Ahli), Adel Al Hosani (Sharjah), Ali Khaseif (Al Jazira), and Khalid Eissa (Al Ain).

In the coaching category, the Leader Award for Best Coach features nominations for Paulo Sousa (Shabab Al Ahli), Miloš Milojević (Al Wasl), Cosmin Olăroiu (Sharjah), and Abdelmajeed Alnemer (Khorfakkan).

The nominees’ list for the Goal of the Year Award includes six players from Shabab Al Ahli: Federico Cartabia, Guilherme Bala, Sardar Azmoun, Luka Milivojević, Harib Suhail, and Yahya Al Ghassani, as well as four players from Al Ain: Kodjo Laba, Alejandro Romero, Yahia Nader, and Soufiane Rahimi, Sharjah’s Firas Ben Arbi, Adel Taarabt, Caio Lucas, and Majed Hassan.

The list also sees the presence of Al Wasl’s Fabio Lima and Nicolás Giménez, in addition to Al Jazira’s Nabil Fekir, Mohamed Elneny, and Abdulla Ramadan, Al Wahda’s Omar Khrbin, Lucas Pimenta, Al Nasr’s Marouan Azarkan, Hussein Mahdi, Ajman’s Junior Flemmings, Lithierry Silva, Kalba’s Mehdi Ghayedi, Khorfakkan’s Tarik Tissoudali, Bani Yas’ Youssouf Niakaté, and Al Bataeh’s Anatole Abang.

Voting for these six awards will open at 2:00 p.m. on Saturday, July 26, and will close at 2:00 p.m. on Thursday, July 31. Voting will be conducted via the official UAE Pro League website and mobile application, and the process will include input from team captains, coaches, media representatives, and fans.

The statistics-based category includes the Golden Shoe for the league’s top scorer, which was won by Laba Kodjo after scoring 20 goals, the Golden Shoe for ADIB Cup’s top scorer, as it was clinched by Al Jazira’s Ramon Mierez, as well as the Silver Shoe for the League U23 top scorer, and it was decided by Al Wahda’s Mansoor Almenhali. The statistics-based category also includes, Fans League Award, the ADNOC Pro League’s Fantasy Manager of the Year, and the Dream Team award.

Finally, the UAE Pro League will present an award based on specific criteria: the Professional Excellence in Club Licensing award, which will be granted to the club that meets the defined standards outlined by the UAE Pro League.

Quoted from WAM agency with modification