Ghana has a strong presence on the shortlists for the 2026 CAF Awards. Antoine Semenyo is in the running for Player of the Year, Caleb Yirenkyi for Young Player of the Year, and the Black Stars and Black Queens for team honours, according to reports by MyJoyOnline.
The awards ceremony will be held in Lagos, Nigeria, on Monday, December 7, 2026.
Semenyo, the Manchester City forward, is one of ten players shortlisted for the continent's top individual prize, MyJoyOnline reports. His performances helped City win the FA Cup and the Carabao Cup during the period under review, and he was part of the Black Stars squad at the 2026 FIFA World Cup in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
He faces stiff competition. The full shortlist, according to the report, is:
Twenty-year-old midfielder Caleb Yirenkyi is one of ten nominees for Young Player of the Year. MyJoyOnline reports that he was shortlisted after strong performances for Danish club FC Nordsjælland and a move to English club Coventry City.
He also scored Ghana's winning goal against Panama at the World Cup, a result that helped the Black Stars reach the knockout stage.
His rivals include Ibrahim Maza (Algeria), Christian Kofane (Cameroon), Christ Inao and Yan Diomande (Ivory Coast), Hamza Abdelkarim (Egypt), Ishmael Kamissoko (Mali), Abdellah Ouazane and Ayoub Bouaddi (Morocco) and Ibrahim Mbaye (Senegal).
The Black Stars are one of ten nominees for Men's National Team of the Year, alongside Algeria, Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, DR Congo, Egypt, Morocco, Senegal, South Africa and Tunisia, MyJoyOnline reports.
Ghana won five of their six matches to qualify for the World Cup and reached the knockout phase for the first time since 2010, according to the report.
The Black Queens have also been nominated for the women's team award.
The nominations come at a difficult moment for the senior men's team. MyJoyOnline reports that Ghana have won only one of their last eight matches in all competitions and lost their first two 2027 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers, against Ivory Coast and The Gambia, leaving them bottom of Group C. They face Somalia in a double-header in mid-November.
The CAF Awards are African football's biggest night, recognising the continent's top players, coaches and teams across the men's and women's game. Ghanaian winners of the main Player of the Year award in the past include Abedi Pele, who won the African Footballer of the Year award three times in the early 1990s.
A win for Semenyo would make him the first Ghanaian to claim the top prize in decades, while a Young Player award for Yirenkyi would add to his growing reputation.
The nomination of the Black Queens is a boost for women's football in Ghana, coming in the same season that the U-17 Black Maidens reached the quarter-finals of the FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup in Morocco. Growing success at youth and senior level has raised hopes of a stronger future for the women's game.
Football remains one of Ghana's biggest shared passions, and the CAF Awards are often a social as well as a sporting event, with musicians, actors and fans dressing up and travelling for the ceremony. Ghanaian stars regularly show support for players online, and the nominations are likely to spark plenty of conversation on social media.
Final shortlists and winners will be announced in the coming weeks. Before then, the Black Stars' November qualifiers against Somalia offer a chance to lift the mood ahead of the ceremony in Lagos.
