AFC considers calling off "the best" award

The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) is considering the cancellation of "the best" ceremony at which the player voted the best of the continent is presented with the award. This is due to the ongoing covid-19 pandemic situation, although the Asian governing body has already announced six shortlisted players.

The confederation is weighing up settling for the third stage of narrowing the candidates down in which the players Salem Al-Dawsari, Akram Afif, Alireza Beiranvand, Tomoaki Makino, Ahmed Al-Dhefiri, and Kim Bo-Kyung were announced as the six final candidates, and calling off the second as well as the first stages where players are further filtered out.

Afif comes in the first place

According to Saudi Arabian newspaper "Arriyadiyah" Qatari Akram Afif comes top of the candidates having earned 34 points, while Saudi Salem Al-Dawsari and Kuwaiti Ahmed Al-Dhefiri share second place with 33 points.

The football governing body is also considering calling off the AFC Asian Cup in which the Saudi Arabian national team was supposed to participate as the reigning champions as they lifted the trophy in 2018 in Indonesia. In addition to this the AFC U-20 Asian Cup would also be cancelled due to the developments of the pandemic and the surging numbers of new cases in many countries. Both competitions were set to take place in March and April of 2021.

This comes at a time when FIFA have decided to cancel the U-19 and U-17 World Cup tournaments with the next editions set to be held in 2023 in Indonesia and Peru respectively.