Sterling Reveals His Vote For Player Of The Season
By Max Wise
Raheem Sterling has revealed that England captain Harry Kane got his vote as Player of the Season.
Kane, who missed out on the final six-man shortlist for the award, is Tottenham’s top scorer this season with 24 goals from 39 appearances.
Liverpool defender, Virgil Van Dijk, is the odds-on favourite for the award, alongside Raheem Sterling, and the Dutch defender has previously revealed that he voted Sterling as his favourite, but the English winger has not returned the favour.
"I voted for Harry Kane. My vote for him is because he scores so many goals every year, he does so much for the team, gives so much for his team.
"There was a lot of talk about Virgil van Dijk. I knew he would have a lot of the votes, so I looked at someone I thought being around him in the national team, how he puts in his work, his work ethic, how he looks after himself.
"He's always there, especially coming back from injury, as a professional I looked at him and that's my reason for voting for him, seeing him on a day-to-day with the national team."
The English Football Association released the six-man shortlist over the weekend with previous winner, Mohamed Salah, of Liverpool missing out of the list that has Virgil Van Dijk, Sterling, Aguero, Sadio Mane, Bernardo Silva and Eden Hazard as the nominees.
Sterling's Manchester City and Liverpool are neck-to-neck in the title race and the player insists he will not trade the title for the best player award though being elated by his inclusion in the last six.
"It's nice to be recognised on that front but, to be honest, if we don't win the Premier League, I don't really want to be in contention," said Sterling.
"What I want to do is win the Premier League, win the FA Cup, then think about stuff like that, even though the awards are before that. Without that, it doesn't mean much to me, really.
The winner for this season’s Professional Footballers Association(PFA) Player of the Year will be announced at an awards ceremony in London on Sunday.