FIFA Woman World Player of the Year 2012 Nominations

It may be early for nominations for FIFA Woman Player of the Year 2012 but I would like to start with a player that came to her own during this year's Algarve Cup. She is Celia Okoyino da Mbabi of Germany. During this year's competition she scored six goals, three of them against Japan in the finals. In that game she placed a header in the goal, scored a penalty kick against Kahori, and did a bicycle kick to score the winning goal in extra time of the second half of regular time. She shouldn't be overlooked just because the German women's team won't be in this year's Olympics.

Is marta's trophy why even nominate anybody else

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Actually, it's Sawa's trophy now. X-D

Anyway, if we're looking at Algarve (and Cyprus), you should probably throw in Morgan (USA) and Behringer(GER).

The only other things that come to mind right for places to look for POTW candidates are the few EURO qualifying matches 2012 has seen so far [Behringer and Mbabi already impressed there, too, even if their opponent was just TUR] and the CONCACAF Olys qualifying [you could point to any number of USA players, including Morgan, as well as Sinclair(CAN)] though all of those have to be taken with the grain of salt that the rest of CONCACAF is, well...

1 Marta 5 2 1
2 Birgit Prinz 3 5 0
3 Mia Hamm 2 2 0
4 Homare Sawa 1 0 0
5 Tiffeny Milbrett 0 1 0
Kristine Lilly 0 1 0
7 Sun Wen 0 0 2
Cristiane 0 0 2
9 Kelly Smith 0 0 1
Shannon Boxx 0 0 1
Renate Lingor 0 0 1
Hanna Ljungberg 0 0 1
Fatmire Bajramaj 0 0 1
Abby Wambach 0 0 1

before i put morgan in the mix, i'd need to see her play for a full season in a league, either the wps is back and she's the #1 striker on a team or she goes to germany or sweden. just based uswnt stats, if sydney had as many caps, she'd have crazy numbers too at her scoring rate. based on the sweden game today, pia will pad numbers in a minute if you let her. then, mix that in with her inflated national team stats. i won't comment on hamm because she is before my time but i'm guessing her body of work is a mix uswnt and wusa when she won?

I think this is a fair assessment. Hopefully Morgan will be able to play full time on a club in 2013, either in the WPS or a competitive European league. A person needs success at both the national and club levels to earn a nomination.

As far as Leroux is concerned, I do think she's a good player, but her stats are a bit deceiving at this point. She has 7 gioals in 9 games, but 5 came against Guatemala. I still think she's super talented, but we'll get a better feel for what she can do in the next 6 or 7 matches before the Olympics.

Right right, of course club performances should be as important (maybe more so?) than the more infrequent national team appearances. If I was more knowledgeable on the European leagues, I would've suggested more candidates. (As is, I'm only familiar with Australia's W-League, and there weren't that many games in '12 there, either.) I was just responding to the OP which only seemed to reference the Algarve.

AND I was simply taking a shot at the Brazil nut above: however many Marta's won, Sawa's the current holder of the award. ^.^

Did I miss something? Ideas for 2012 WPOTY nominations are already forming around the performances seen throughout the Algarve cup? lol.

Mbabi has little to no chance of wining FIFA's top individual prize any time soon. For me she's still more notorious for being consistently good, at being frustratingly inconsistent . Every season her club team goes from relegation fodder to a possible domestic cup challenger, while her own form is hmmmm?. Her last two performances for Germany were the best she's ever had, and she's still no where near as good a Inka Grings. In fact, if Inka Grings couldn't win the POTY award when she was featuring prominently at all levels, I don't see what Mbabi does that would make her any more likely to best a always relevant Marta.

Marta and her international team mates are now reunited with their old coach, and she's back in Europe, so it wouldn't be surprising to see her return to something like her old self. Schelin thanks to the improved status of both her club and country, always looks to be on the verge of major global recognition, while the U.S. new go to girl is Morgan, and you can guarantee as long as she's scoring for the sports most high profile team, she going to be on that list. People won't soon forget that Japan swept the board as world champs last season, but the European club landscape will be more prominent this time, and that should heavily favour French nominations in 2012.

OJ, but what else will she do for the year? She played well, but I had not seen that before.

Besides, and even though her team won, she was not tournament MVP. That was Aya Miyama. Its too early to nominate, but she is my points leader so far.

Because the UEFA W's CL 2012 is done and all... I'd like to put Camille Abily name in the list too

If the U.S. wins the Olympics you have to figure that either Wambach or Morgan will be in contention for the award. Abby probably more so since she took 3rd place last year and deserves more recognition for her career stats. Germany is not in the Olympics so I doubt Mbabi can be considered.

Mbabi would't have been considered any way, but a number of the best players from a great treble winning FC Lyon team will be, and they all happen to play for decent Olympic bound WNT's too.

If France wins Olympic gold or even silver, then some of their best players would certainly be in consideration. Heck, I'm sure Marta would win the title again if Brazil managed to win gold.

Ha, Marta would need to pull a Maradona 86 to even stand a chance this season, but we are talking about the women's player of the year so..... your probably right.

Abily would be the most obvious option from France, but Sawa had to take the role of a female centre midfielder to another level to win the POTY last time around, and that win was only by stupidly close hairs width margin too... The other top candidate would be the constantly over looked option of Schelin, but she plays for the perennial f**k ups... sorry, underachievers of Sweden so......

For me, in less your outstanding, an Olympic gold shouldn't automatically give you a WPOTY trophy. As a competition, the Olympics are not as developed as a WWC, and you have a lot of talented players instantly overlooked by the quirks of tournament qualification, in seasons they could end up playing double the important games of many of their rivals too. I mean, if competitive regional NT/club football doesn't matter, FIFA should only hand out a WPOTY award, in the two years we have the two important global events, but how counterproductive would that be, right?

Yeah, I agree.

In the past the WPOTY has been given to arguably the most recognizable players that have done just enough to earn the award. Hamm, Prinz, Marta and Sawa have all achieved legendary status in the game, so giving them the award did not cause a huge uproar. Hamm was given the award in the early 2000's for all her contributions in the 90's. Prinz won the WC with Germany in 2003 and was the best female player at the time. Marta is arguably the most gifted female soccer player in the world who took her team far into the WC and Olympics in the years she won the award. She also dominated the WPS league for a couple of years. Sawa led an underdog Japanese team to win to an unbelievable WC title after her country suffered a devistating earthquack.

Based on past voting patterns it'll be extremely diffcult for a relatively unknown (at least to the general public) French women like Abily to win the award this year. I personally love how the French team plays (especially Louisa Necib), but they still don't have a standout recognizable player like Prinz to generate the buzz.

Lotta Schelin would probably receive a few votes if Sweden wins the title, but we all know that's not going to happen. Same thing with Sinclair and Canada. Marta has an outside chance if Brazil wins the whole thing, but Brazil would need to vastly improve. Sawa has been injured most of the year, but she could potentially win it again if she scores multiple goals and Japan wins gold. Somehow I doubt she'll be that effective this tournament. Alex Morgan may have a breakout tournament, but I doubt FIFA would give her the award after just one good year. At this point I think Abby Wambach is probably the leading candidate to win it this year especially if the U.S. team wins gold at the Olympics. She's probably the likely choice considering her 3rd place finish last year and her recognizability as one of soccer's elites over the past 12 years. I bet that even if she finishes with several less goals than Morgan by the end of the year, her past achievements would push her over the hump.

Yeah, probably right.

She's probably the likely choice considering her 3rd place finish last year and her recognizability as one of soccer's elites over the past 12 years. I bet that even if she finishes with several less goals than Morgan by the end of the year, her past achievements would push her over the hump. - Is there a Nike France to promote its' best player? Delie is a better striker than Morgan when you look at 38 games or so a piece. Obviously, Morgan will over take her because of the USWNT Club schedule. Morgan has over-the-top stats from the NT but so does Sydney from the couple of caps they have given her. Let Morgan go to Sweden and out do Marta or even Press who is having a good season. Then, talk about FIFA PofY.

But in a similar fashion to Morgan, Delie doesn't play for a heavy weight club side either, so comparing both these players on NT form alone will only ever produce one winner in that popularity race my friend, and that's not going to be Delie .

The FC USWNT program has given some U.S. players like Morgan a weird advantage, but Morgan has also turned a potential position for stagnation, into an advantageous position for growth, and in the process become the prominent face within a very high profile team too. Looking at Delie though, we still see a raw player that isn't even one of France's most important or high profile faces right now, so......

Most people would find that to be a fair comment, but the FIFA WPOTY hasn't been exactly very fair, for a very long time now either .

Not so long ago Marta stole a significant WPOTY from Grings, mainly thanks to obtaining a higher profile after a few months work with a much hyped WPS team. Was this Marta victory fair, during a season Grings won UEFA's major club and national team tournaments, finishing as the top scorer in every competition she entered that season too...... Like skybolt mentions, this is the way things tend to go though, as a players higher status, produces increasingly bigger individual recognition.

Without much serious club football, Hope Solo couldn't even help her NT qualify for the WWC, while Morgan was only a super sub for the U.S., after a fairly mediocre season behind her in WPS too, and yet both these players found themselves in the FIFA WPOTY nominations all thanks to a months work in Germany..... Why should we expect things to be any different this year, when right now we continue to see these players feature even more prominently than ever before.

As usual newsouth takes a quote meant for Abby Wambach and makes it about Alex Morgan. Heck, I could be talking about the drain in my kitchen sink and newsouth will somehow turn it into an argument against Morgan and Nike!

As far as Delie is concerned, even a U.S. high school player can score multiple goals against the likes of Bulgaria, Northern Ireland and Estonia. On the other hand, Morgan has scored 4 goals against Japan, 4 against Sweden, 3 against China, 3 against Canada, 1 against France, 2 against New Zealand, 1 against Italy, 2 against Finland, 1 against Iceland, 2 against Costa Rica, 2 against Denmark, and 2 against Guatemala. All these teams, except for Guatemala are better than most of the teams Delie has scored against. If newsouth wants to counter my argument, then he should list the teams Delie has scored against so we could compare.

As far as Leroux is concerned, unfortunately she has gone scoreless in her last 6 games and has managed only 2 goals in 12 games when dicounting the 5 goals against Guatemala. She will get better, but her numbers are nothing close to Morgan's. In her first 20 games Morgan scored an important tying goal against China to keep the USWNT's home record alive. She also scored an immensely huge goal against Italy to help the US qualify for the WC, and then notched 2 important goals against France and Japan in the WC. All of Leroux's goals have come with the US already ahead by 2 goals.

I have to say though skybolt, I don't think you can compare anything in CONCACAF, to what's taking place within a much more balanced UEFA competition, while the process of the U.S. programs supposedly prestigious friendlies series, versus teams who turn up day's before matches, is only advantageous for the U.S.WNT too, as they find themselves preparing weeks ahead of time, for games that are often just as skewed in the credibility stakes as France having to face any of Europe's developing light weights.

France's European Championship qualification group, is a far better/competitive test than you actually think, so even with Delie's indecisive form, I can't help but imagine the games she's played this year are a significantly more meaningful excise than you suggest. Germany is the only nation in Europe that smashes all before them, and even they recently dropped points for the first time in their history this year, versus a nation that has never been to a world cup, or a Euro Championship.

A medal of any kind in this years Olympic tournament, and Wambach wins this years FIFA WPOTY, but with the way the tournament has USA, Japan, and France, all ready to knock each other out before the medal rounds, you can bet Marta will have something to say about the women games biggest individual honor too

Besides, I can't help but think that Marta's reaction to Sawa winning last year is indicative of how pissed she is that she didn't get it.

I don't think skybolt's comparing CONCACAF all that much. Morgan didn't start until the final match against Canada and saw limited sub minutes in previous games and didn't play in the semi-final at all. Most of her goals have come against strong competition, stronger than Delie's clearly, even if as you say France's qualification group is stronger than us insular Yanks might believe.

France and the US being in the same group does not mean they're positioned to knock each other out before the medal round unless the North Koreans spring a surprise. It actually means they have the opportunity to face each other again in the gold medal match should they win out the rest of the way after their group stage encounter. If Brazil plays the way they have been playing lately I would expect England ... ooh er ... Great Britain to win on home pitch in the group. Moreover, newsouth would do well to keep in mind that when it comes to marketing for US players team performances are massively more important than individual awards.

I know skybolt's not directly comparing CONCACAF with UEFA , as it's honestly comparing night and day, but attempts to highlight who's done what versus who, also sounds silly when both players are producing under such massively different circumstances of what constitutes serious competition.

Right now, Delie is regularly playing in games that matter for her country, versus a mixture of standards of opposition and coaches, all giving close to 100% in the aim of playing in women's footballs third biggest competition. Morgan plays within a rich progressive national team program, geared towards the benefit's of international friendlies, versus established global opposition that come to test themselves with little time for preparation, and an eye towards experimentation.

I have to say though, highlighting big status WNT nations, alongside goals scored, does seems a bit weak, considering that the USA has played Japan and Sweden 3 times each this year, in at least two meaningless friendlies each too, and Morgan has only scored 7 times as USA's main forward. Mbabi after only playing Japan and Sweden once, has managed to score 6 against both . Delie doesn't play that many games versus the so called establishment with France, but even so, playing as the forward in one of Europe's elite sides, she still can't come close to registering at the Euro qualifying rate of Mbabi either .

I'm sure one of USA, Japan, or France will be going home at the quarters, as whoever finishes in the top two group places between USA and France, are on route to face the top two teams from Japan's group, and how much do you wan't to bet that won't actually take place .

Brazil are never as sh*t as they are in friendly competition. They still can't finance the two week stop overs to foreign lands like the U.S. girls, and they don't have the FA/Fed led support/organisation of a serious women's global power to waste what little experimentation time they are given either, but still we see Brazil always come to play once the major events begin.

If they continue to play with the bad habits of their former coach during the last WWC, then....., but seeing how their now back under the coaching that produced the finest attacking unit the women's game has probably ever seen, Marta & Co. could be primed to return to old habits of surprisingly good football with minimal resources.

You seem like a smart guy and whilst some of the statements aren't wrong your conclusions are piffle. Little time for preparation? Well in the case of Sweden and Japan we're now a month out from the start of the Olympic tournament. If they have preparation issues now they might as well just mail it in. Japan is well resourced and prepared (and as an aside is actually, "the most high profile team in the world," given that 20 million Japanese watched the friendly between the US and Japan Monday). The line-ups they used are not going to look a whole lot different from what we see in the UK. Those teams are not experimenting any more than Pia. These recent "friendlies" are critical and competitive tune-ups for the main purpose of addressing any weaknesses before the big event. You cannot really identify those areas for improvement if you're not committing to the matches. Otherwise it wouldn't really be a "test" would it? So they're not meaningless. Whatever effort level you would like to arbitrarily place on these "friendly" test matches it is not unreasonable to conclude the competition is at a higher level than France vs. lower tier teams in their qualification for Euros.

That's great for Mbabi. She's a real force. But has nothing to do with Morgan vs Delie, which was our point of contention and the reason I replied to your comment. "Only seven times as the USA's main forward?" How much and for how long has Alex ever been the USA's "main forward?" Even after finally earning a starting position a few months ago she's still regularly subbed out in the 2nd half. The US played Sweden twice not three times and again they're not meaningless.

Put on your cliche helmet: Two out of three ain't bad. It sounds much better than "the tournament has USA, Japan, and France, all ready to knock each other out before the medal rounds." If two of those teams can reach the gold medal match then it's not quite that bad even if one falls by the wayside before the medal round. Also the first place team from USA/France's group does not face a top two team from Japan's group in the Quarters. They face one of the top finishing third place teams.

You can never dismiss a team with Marta but this turn around would have to be more drastic than ever before. During 2008 the US had three "friendly" preparation matches against Brazil leading up to the Beijing Olympics. They were all one goal games. All won by the US 1-0. The same score as the Olympic final.

On another note and slightly more on the original thread topic, if the US wins in London and either Abby or Alex wins the award it's not going to be a crime.

PIFFLE . The last time I checked, the only thing anybody won by playing endless friendlies, was FIFA ranking points. One other team besides the U.S. in the world of international women's football uses the meaningless friendly to generate false expectations of quality, and that's the cheerful neighbours from further up north called Canada.

No other WNT program can spend, or will spend, as much time and money in preparation for high kudos friendlies as the USSF, and this tends to be because it's pointless for other nations to do so if they already play within regions filled with decent competition for development.

Oh, and to hear an American fan calling Japan the most popular team in women's football is just..... One look at any piece of info relating to the Japanese WNT's media/cultural presence prior to the WWC quarter final versus Germany, and you will see just how spectacular the recent upward trend for the kinds of attention they can regularly generate now, actually is.

Luckily right now we are living in a time frame where the internet allows us to actually see these so called high importance friendlies more often, and a simple fact becomes obvious, very quickly. The random team selections, and inconsistent levels of play, always produce football way off what we expect to see at the major global events. The U.S. may bring it's strongest 11 and maximum effort to every friendly, but the opposition are most certainly not. Ego fluffing, without progression = meaningless .

While massaging ones ego's can be nice though, the true "test" element of these friendlies only comes into full view as things get serious, and guess what happens, the U.S. girls go back to looking like anything but the #1 rank they continue to hold onto for dear life .

I use Mbabi, because I felt it was poor form to try and hype up Morgan's accomplishments, when Europe also has their own athletic goal machine doing the exact same things on the stats too, but without all the fuss.

When we still have a young Marta running around as the highest point of evolution in the female game, all I can think is FIFA POTY for Morgan..., for Delie....., for Mbabi.......

When did the U.S. become the global barometer of a teams potential quality? Brazil didn't reach 08's final, or the one before that, thanks to outlandish amounts of fortune. Both times Brazil showcased the kinds of superiority throughout the tournament, which has seen them on the cusp of victory in every major tournament for the past decade, only to lose out thanks to a mixture of naivety, and poor finishing.

Yes the U.S., Japan, and even Canada have beaten Brazil, but so what, when has this ever been different for Brazil prior to a major tournament? When have they ever been focused towards wining friendlies away from the comfort zone of their own doorstep?

Brazil just had to go through the surprise return of their greatest coach, and a hard core exorcism of the old coaches god awful approach to the game. This was always going to mean taking big steps backwards, to eventually move forward again.

I'm sorry, but the Olympics would have to be a pretty ordinary/poor tournament for bothWambach and Morgan to go unchallenged for a WPOTY award, thanks to a few goals and another scrappy tournament performance. For all the important friendly wins since '99 , every WWC and Olympics since then, has never seen the U.S. produce any of the major tournaments best teams to watch, constantly lacking the services of the games best individual talents too.

All I'm going to say is that there's only 1 month left before the Olympics start. May the best teams and best players leave it all out on the field and prove to us that they deserve to be top contenders for the award. If Wambach and Morgan score multiple goals during the tournament and the U.S. wins gold then they should be front runners to win the WPOTY award. If they fizzle and the U.S. loses before the final game, then I'll be the first person to say that they should not be in contention. If Delie can put on a great show, score 4 goals, and lead the French team to the finals, then she should also be in contention, as well as other French stars. If Marta can take the Brazilian team on her shoulders and win gold after their current struggles, then that's just another notch in her great career. She's stll the best all around player in the world, but her team has to do well for her to be considered. If by some miracle Canada can pull out the upset and win then Sinclair should be a top contender as well. Same thing with Schelin.

I just feel that since there's no clear cut top player (with past accomplishments) this year, and the Olympics will most likely dictate who wins the award. Wambach is probably the leading candidate at this point due to her legendary status, but the U.S. must at least make the final and her score 4 goals or more to qualify.

Once the Olympics are completed and the winner crowned, there should be no excuses for the non victors. The reason why I defend Morgan so much on these boards, and perhaps may go a little overboard at times, is because I want to provide a rebuttle against constant undeserved attacks on her by people like newsouth. In the past newsouth has stated that Morgan can only score late in games as a sub against tired defenders (even though that's how Delie scores most of her goals), and does not have the skill to be a 90 minute player. 13 games and 17 goals later as a starter, and we all know how wrong he was with this prediction. He has also stated that any generic top scoring US college player can match her numbers if given the chance, which does nothing but demean the women's game. If Morgan scores 6 goals in the Olympic tournament and the U.S wins gold, then he'll make excuses that Brazil doesn't care about this tournament since it's not the WC, Germany was not there, the U.S spends 10 times more money than anyone else so they should win, Nike gave it to her, Christen Press would've scored 12 goals, etc. If in 3 years time Morgan does the same in the WC, then newsouth will probably say who cares, this is just the women's game, can she play as good as Messi.....no! So no matter what Morgan does she will never gain the respect of some of her detractors and they will always make excuses why she shouldn't be considered a top notch player.