Whoscored: No Eagle as Kudus named star player in AFCON group stage best XI
Football statistics website, Who scored.com has snubbed Nigerian players and named Ghana midfielder, Mohammed Kudus as the start player in its Africa Cup of
Nations, AFCON 2023 group stage best XI.
Victor Osimhen is the reigning African Player of the year but the Napoli star has done little to make Nigeria genuine title contender albeit the Super Eagles
won two of their three group stage matches.
Intead, Whoscored’s Best XI features those who have made at least two appearances with stars from Ghana, Morocco, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Cape
Verde, Tunisia, Senegal and Mauritania all making the cut.
In goal is Jesus Owono of Equatorial Guinea.
‘The first of two Equatorial Guinea representatives in the XI, Jesus Owono made a total of 10 saves across his three group stage outings, that ranking
second, and provided an assist as the 22-year-old returned a WhoScored rating of 7.47’, wrote the website.
Morocco’s Achraf Hakimi with a 7.79 rating is also named in the best X1.
‘Hakimi was directly involved in two Atlas Lions goals across their three games, scoring once, while he was unfortunate to register just one assist having
made 10 key passes; no player has made more at AFCON so far.’
Kialonda Gaspar of Angola with a rating of 7.39, Logan Costa of Cape Verde (7.33), Tunisia’s Ali Abdi (7.31) and another Moroccan, former Chelsea star,
Hakim Ziyech (7.49) also in the mix.
Kudus of Ghana with a rating of 8.28 is the top rated player by Whoscored.
‘Ghana disappointed at AFCON, crashing out in the group stages, but Mohammed Kudus did enough to return a WhoScored rating of 8.28, that better than any
other player in the competition so far. Kudus netted twice in his two outings and completed the third most dribbles (8) to nail down his spot in the side,’
wrote Whoscored.
Lamine Camara of Senegal, Aboubakary Koita of Mauritania, Emilio Nsue of Equatorial Guinea and Mostafa Mohamed of Egypt complete the Whoscored Best X1 of the
group phase.
