By Solomon Nwoke

_On a night that Ivorian star midfielder, Yaya Toure rewrote African history books by winning a fourth consecutive CAF African Player of the Year award in Lagos, it was left to the women to save the day for Nigerian football, as they picked up valuable awards at a colourful ceremony held at the Eko Hotel in Lagos.

The Manchester City international was awarded the continent’s top individual award ahead of Gabon striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Nigeria goalkeeper Vincent Enyeama.

The 31-year-old was seemingly a shoe-in for the honour, having been nominated after helping lead the Citizens to a Premier League and FA Cup double last season, while he also played a pivotal role in Cote d’Ivoire’s successful qualification to the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations.

Toure joins Samuel Eto’o in becoming the only other player to win the African honour four times, although the Cameroonian striker did not achieve the feat in successive years.

While Toure was busy dwarfing Nigerian men, it was up to the women to save Nigerian blushes. It is not so surprising to hear that Nigeria that collected six out of eleven 2013 Glo-Caf awards, has gone one step down in the 2014 Glo-Caf awards as they received five out of fourteen Caf awards on Thursday, 8 January 2015 at Eko Hotel and Suites Lagos.

Nigerian Football enjoyed more successful football glory in 2013 than the year 2014, as it suffered a lot of set backs, ranging from leadership crises in the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to organizational misunderstandings that characterized their failure to qualify for Afcon 2015.

But notwithstanding, the Women football team in Nigeria have proved that football in Nigeria is not in any measure a write-off, as they demonstrated greatness in many tournaments like the Fifa U-20 Women’s World Cup in Canada where Nigerian team reached the finals only to be defeated 0-1 by Germany, and the African Women’s Championship that took place in Namibia which they won and also qualified for the women’s World Cup. Holding in Calana this summer.

It is not a mistake to say that it was their superb performances that earned them dominance in the five awards Nigeria collected in the 2014 Glo-Caf awards where they grabbed three out of the five awards that Nigeria received.

The five awards are as follows.

Women’s Player of the Year. Asisat Oshoala (Nigeria and River Angels)

Youth Player of the Year. Asisat Oshoala(Nigeria, River Angels)

Women’s National Team of the Year. Nigeria

Platinium Award. His Excellency Goodluck Jonathan (President of Nigeria)

CAF Finest XI. Goalkeeper- Vincent Enyeama (Nigeria), Midfielder- Ahmed Musa(Nigeria).