Asamoah Gyan rues not winning 2003 GPL top-scorer award

Ghanaian striker Asamoah Gyan has shared his regret of not being able to win the top scorer award in the 2003 Ghana Premier League season.

Gyan, then a 17 year old was making his league debut for Liberty Professionals and had gotten his season off to a flyer.

He shared how quickly he settled in the Liberty setup despite being a rookie in an interview with TV3’s Juliet Bawuah.

“I was ready coming into the premier league, at the age of 17 years, I was (very much) ready. So I was able to fit into the premier league as if I had played like ten years already” he said.

“That was my first season and it was the only season I played in the Ghana Premier League, that was the 2003 season”.

“I was able to fit in very easily and I was scoring goals” he noted

Indeed Gyan had a blistering start to the season despite being a teenager and a rookie.

His goal-scoring prowess did not take long to come to light and he set his sights on climbing to the summit of the top scorer’s chart.

However frequent travels abroad for trial stints with foreign clubs affected this ambition. He missed a couple of matches for the Scientific Soccer Lads and was then disadvantaged as against other strikers chasing the top scorer gong.

Eventually, Shaibu Yakubu who was then playing for Obuasi Goldfields (now AshantiGold SC) emerged top scorer with 13 goals while Gyan placed third after scoring 10 goals in 16 league games.

Now 34 years old, Gyan speaks of how regretful he is at not being able to crown what was a brilliant first and only season in the local league with the goal king prize.

He said “for me, I regret not being the top scorer because that time I was traveling, I was going for trials so I didn’t play most of the games”.

“But I finished third in the scoring charts. Shaibu Yakubu was the top scorer, and Kwadwo Poku was second and I placed third”.

“But I still say if I had played all games, I would have been the top scorer in the 2003 premier league” he boldly claimed.

Gyan left Liberty Professionals for Italian Serie A club Udinese. After a 2 year loan spell at Modena, he would come to nail a place at the Zebras before transferring to French Ligue 1 side Rennes.

Subsequent spells in England with Sunderland and later in the UAE, China and Turkey will follow.

The all-time top scorer for the Black Stars last played for North East United in India and is currently nursing an injury.