Essien Will Miss Awards Ceremony

Claude LeRoy has forbidden Michael Essien from attending the African Footballer of the Year ceremony, which will be held this Friday in Lome, Togo.

Essien was shortlisted for this award along with Didier Drogba (Ivory Coast), Mahamadou Diarra (Mali), Frederic Kanoute (Mali), and Emmanuel Adebayor (Togo).

The Confederation of African Football doesn’t quite understand why Essien will be prevented from attending since they would only be gone for two hours (it’s a 15 minute flight from Accra), but LeRoy was adamant.

Mali coach Jean Francois Jodar also forbade Frederic Kanoute to go last Monday, but now that Mali are out of the tournament, he might change his mind.

*Notice how all these guys are graduates of Ligue 1? Three from Lyon? I’m just saying…