Former Super Eagles captain Austin Jay-Jay Okocha had a largely successful career that spanned over 12 years, but has revealed his regrets playing the game.
The former Bolton star rued missing out on the CAF African Player of the year award during his playing career.
Okocha had an illustrious career which included spells at Eintracht Frankfurt, Fenerbahce, Paris Saint Germain and Bolton Wanderers and was also a core member of the Super Eagles squad that won the 1994 Africa Cup of Nations and also qualified for their first World Cup the same year.
However, despite his brilliance and talents, the 46-year-old never had the honour of being named the best player in Africa.
Though Okocha was nominated three times (1998, 2003 and 2004), but his best-ever finish was second place in 1998 and 2004, while he ended up in third place in 2003.
Failure to win the ultimate prize is something Okocha regrets, although he was proud of his career.
In a Master Card sponsored Q&A with popular on-air personality Toke Makinwa, the former PSG star was asked by a fan the biggest regret in his career.
“Well, I think I don’t want to sound greedy, but I’ve had an amazing career, I never thought I would make it that big,” Okocha said.
“But of course, if you look back, there’s always a time that you say oh maybe you could’ve done a bit better than you did. And if I’m to say, I’ll say, I regret not winning the African Footballer of the year.’’
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However, Okocha believed he did enough to win the award, saying winning the BBC African player of the year three times shows that.
This article was most recently revised and updated 4 years ago
