. Tembo

By SANDRA MWILA –
ZANACO captain Ziyo Tembo has been voted the 2016 MTN-FAZ footballer-of-the-year after putting in an all-year stellar performance that helped his side to winning the league with a record 81 breaking points.
Tembo received the award last night at a colourful ceremony held at Hotel Inter-continental in Lusaka and ignited celebrations from his fellow players and the Zanaco enthusiasts in the crowd.
Tembo, who was at the centre of the Zanaco defence, also saw the team finish the season with just three losses from 34 games and their 81 points was nine clear of second placed finishers and defending champions Zesco United.
Zanaco has only conceded 16 goals this season and despite being a defender Tembo also boasts of contributing six goals.
To win the title, Tembo shrugged off competition from the likes of Nkana striker Walter Bwalya and Zesco midfielder Mischeck Chaila.
And on the top scorer award, Nkana’s Bwalya took the honour after he fired in an astonishing 24 goals from 34 games.
Also walking away with awards from the plush Gala at Hotel Inter-continental was Power Dynamos   striker Patson Daka who won the young-player-of-the-year award after scoring an impressive 12 goals in the season.
Daka has been heavily criticised over the last two years,  mainly because coaches at the various national teams have insisted on playing him when he was not scoring but he has finally repaid all those coaches’ faith with a good performance this year.
He had a dry spell in the 2015 season, scoring only two goals but came back strong this season after much criticism and even took three awards from the club including the players’ player-of-the-year and top scorer.
Others Daka beat to the award yesterday were Charles Zulu of Zanaco and Zesco’s Shemmy Mayembe who was part of the under-20 squad at the just-ended COSAFA championship in South Africa.
The most disciplined player award  went to Zesco’s captain Jacob Banda who beat Tembo and Zanaco’s Aubrey Funga in the category while the President’s award went to Zesco’s defender David Odhiambo.
Odhimbo was instrumental in the Zesco defence. At the Zesco Club awards, he took a brace as he got away with the chairperson  and  fans’  awards.
The referee-of-the-year award  went to Wisdom Chewe who was nominated alongside Janny Sikazwe and Stanley Hachiwa.
Assistant referee-of-the-year went to Kabwe Chansa who was nominated along with Bruno Tembo and Mercy Zulu.