All Round Entertainer

It was reported recently that a comedian stormed out of his country’s big award ceremony after Asamoah Gyan was named as the ‘Most Popular Entertainer in Ghana.’ The Sunderland striker beat off all competition due to his immense contribution to the national team… and for his dance moves that he uses to celebrate all his goals. ‘Baby Jet’, as Gyan is also known, has also entranced the nation with his song ‘African girls” - cited as another reason for his success. It makes me think that Kevin Nolan is only one hit record away from taking some pretty big awards off Peter Kay. His ‘chicken dance’ goal celebration alone, must surely already make him one of the country’s leading light entertainers.

Gyan has clearly taken things up a notch, but I have often thought that some countries’ Sports Personality of the Year Awards must be lacking a certain level of competitiveness. The drama of the Swiss ceremony, for example, must lose something when Roger Federer, arguably the greatest ever tennis player, is having one of his better years. When the 16-time Grand Slam winner edged to victory (again) in 2007, the female award went to an orienteer. Now I’m not saying that Simone Niggli-Luder can’t read a map better than most, but she might have struggled to claim a unisex top prize.

Didier Drogba won the Footballer of the Year award for all of Africa in 2006 so the Ivory Coast Footballer of the Year award probably didn’t come as too much of a surprise that year. The individual accolades have continued to come thick and fast, but the incredibly high esteem in which the Chelsea player is held in back home may surprise a few in the UK. Drogba is actually credited with playing a vital role in bringing peace to his country. After the Ivorians qualified for the 2006 World Cup, Drogba made a desperate plea to the civil war combatants to lay down their arms. The striker’s words had a striking impact: a ceasefire was declared after five years of fighting. And you thought he was just some big guy who went down too easily under a challenge? Well, it turns out you can be slightly too delicate on a football pitch AND a national peace ambassador.

With this in mind, the winner of the British Sports Personality of the Year award really need to up their game. Ok, 2010 recipient Tony McCoy may have won the Grand National at the 15th attempt, but he did virtually nothing to reduce the national debt or get student tuition fees scrapped. Or to rival Gyan in the entertainment stakes, he’s surely been gifted a surname that would allow him to take Gary Lineker head on in a rival crisp campaign. The possibilities seem endless.

The word ‘personality’ is prominent in the award title for a reason. You can’t win if people don’t take to you, but if they do, just being in the general ball-park of achievement may be enough. A quick look at certain former winners provides a case in point. In 2009 Ryan Giggs won the big prize despite being frequently used that year as a substitute by Manchester United. The Welshman has undeniably had a glittering career, but those cheeky scamps, the general public, effectively high-jacked the vote when a ‘lifetime achievement’ award is already up for grabs. Note that achievement is in the brief for that prize. Celebrating a lifetime of sporting personality is something that would inevitably just play into the hands of a showman like Phil Tufnell. The man known affectionately as ‘The Cat,’ ‘Two Sugars’ and ‘Tuffers’ has entertained literally several people over the years. If you come out of a cricket career with three nicknames in the bag you know you must have done something right.

Boxer Frank Bruno played the part of national treasure so well that he finished second in the 1989 Sports Personality vote. His major achievement of the year was being beaten up by Mike Tyson for five rounds in Las Vegas. Brave, but not exactly sporting excellence. David Beckham became so popular, after people decided that they should stop hating him, that his last minute free-kick against Greece in 2001 made him a shoo-in to win the award that year. England qualifying for a tournament has never been so well received. He even managed a second place the following year after a largely disappointing World Cup campaign in which his major contribution was scoring a penalty while he generally struggled to recover fully from injury. I guess some years are more competitive than others. In 2010 Beckham won the Lifetime Achievement Award, lest we forget his penalty in 2002. It was the one that got away for Ryan Giggs.

So what of 2011? Has anybody British achieved something truly outstanding in a world context as of yet? The fact that most bookmakers have Andy Murray as their current favourite for the award at a best price of 7/1 pretty much says it all. The Scottish tennis player has recently undergone the worst slump in his professional career. Before Monte Carlo last week, the British number one had gone three months without a match win of any description. Commendably, he was a finalist at the Australian Open in January, but was soundly beaten by Novak Djokovic. The emergence of the Serb as a true force this year makes the Holy Grail of a Murray win at Wimbledon look more unlikely than ever. He was already struggling to fend off Nadal and Federer as it is.

What Murray does have in his favour though is a dry sense of humour, almost undetectable to the human eye, but it is there. A burgeoning friendship with American funnyman Will Ferrell could ensure his place in the entertainment industry for years to come. The filmstar was rather taken by the way Murray showed off his ‘guns’ at the US Open. If flexing his muscles wasn’t enough, and it clearly is, he can now also fall back on a hit record of his own. Murray’s ‘rap’ on ‘Autograph’ would give ‘Baby Jet’ a run for his money if the Scotsman was ever to unearth a Ghanaian Grandmother and defect.