Mohamed Salah has won the Football Writers’ Association (FWA) award for men’s footballer of 2024-25 by a historic margin, as Alessia Russo won the women’s award.
Salah played a key part in securing Liverpool’s second Premier League title in six seasons. The 32-year-old has scored 33 times and provided 23 assists across 49 matches this season, five goals clear of Newcastle United’s Alexander Isak in the race for the Premier League’s Golden Boot award.
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Russo, 26, has scored 12 times in 20 Women’s Super League (WSL) matches for Arsenal this season, while also netting eight times to help her side to the Women’s Champions League final, where they will face Barcelona on May 24 in Lisbon.
Egypt captain Salah secured 90 per cent of the vote from over 900 FWA members, which the association says the biggest margin this century.
Salah’s Liverpool team-mate Virgil van Dijk placed second in the vote, with Isak third and Arsenal midfielder Declan Rice fourth.
Salah — who alongside Van Dijk committed his future to Liverpool last month with both signing new two-year deals — was voted FWA Player of the Year in 2018 and 2022, with this season’s gong equaling Thierry Henry’s record of three awards.
Meanwhile, Arsenal forward Russo beat Manchester City striker Khadija ‘Bunny’ Shaw to the women’s player of the year award.
The women’s award was first issued in 2018 to Fran Kirby, with Russo the first Arsenal player to win it since Vivianne Miedema’s award in 2020.
Russo finished ahead of Shaw, who won the award last year, with her Arsenal team-mate Mariona Caldentey third and Chelsea captain Millie Bright fourth. The FWA said 39 different players in the women’s game received votes.
Salah and Russo will be handed their awards on May 22.
(Top image: Salah via Carl Recine/Getty Images, Russo via Richard Pelham/Getty Images)
