Bulgarian PM Wins Footballer of Year Title in Fans Vote

Bulgaria's 52-year-old Prime Minister, Boyko Borisov (right), is a passionate football fan and an amateur player. Photo by BGNES

Bulgaria's Prime Minister Boyko Borisov has ranked first in the list of 20 nominees for the 2011 "Footballer of the Year" title after the fans' vote.

Enrolled in "Vitosha" (Bistrita) Borisov finished with 3 501 votes, leaving behind the country's top football star "Manchester United" striker and seven-time winner of the title Dimitar Berbatov with 1 955 votes (24%).

Also curiously enough, a footballer from the fifth-division's "Shipka" (Dragor) Vasil Lukaev, is third with 430 votes (5%).

The voting of fans ended at midnight on December 4th-5th, and now journalists are to determine the prize winner.Votes received so far will not be taken into account.

Georgi Iliev, a midfielder for "Cherno More" (Black Sea, Varna), is last among the nominations with 19 votes.

Outside the top ten is long-time national football team member, Martin Petrov, who plays for "Bolton." He got 34 votes, which secured him only the 15th place.

The awards ceremony will be held on December 23 in the hotel complex "Tsarsko Selo" (King's Village) in the outskirts of Sofia. The top three will receive a gold, silver and bronze ball respectively, while the winner of the title will also get a special cup.

The top ten footballers of Bulgaria, according to the fans' vote are:

1. Boyko Borisov ("Vitosha Bistrica") - 44% (3 501 votes)
2. Dimitar Berbatov ("Manchester United") - 24% (1 955 votes)
3. Vasil Lukaev ("Shipka Dragor") - 5% (430 votes)
4. Nikolay Mihaylov ("Twente") - 5% (397 votes)
5. Stiliyan Petrov ("Aston Villa") - 5% (382 votes)
6. Vladimir Gadzhev ("Levski") - 3% (243 votes)
7. Branimir Kostadinov ("Botev Vratsa") - 2% (134 votes)
8. Hristo Yovov ("Levski") - 1% (113 votes)
9. Spas Delev (CSKA) - 1% (94 votes)
10. Todor Yanchev (CSKA) - 1% (91).

Last Friday, Borisov declared he was not delighted by the fact he is leading in the country's football player of the year poll, contradicting earlier statements he was happy about it and deserved to get the title.

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