Former Gunner Granit Xhaka and current Arsenal star Lia Walti picked up the Swiss Player of the Year awards for 2023 on Monday night.
The SFV (Swiss Football Association) and the SFL (Swiss Football League) announced on Monday night that Granit Xhaka and Lia Walti were the winners of their Swiss Footballer of the Year awards for 2023.
Though he isn’t an Arsenal player anymore, Xhaka was nominated for the Men’s Player of the Year award in part due to his form with the Gunners in the first half of 2023.
The former Arsenal midfielder was excellent for the Gunners in 2022/23, and he’s gone on to be part of a very strong Bayer Leverkusen side in the first half of 2023/24.
Xhaka beat out fellow nominees in Manchester City’s Manuel Akanji and Burnley’s Zeki Amdouni to lift the prize for a third time, having previously won it in 2017 and 2022.
As for Walti, the Arsenal Women star won the Women’s Player of the Year award ahead of Ramona Bachmann and Gaelle Thalmann.
Once again, it’s a much-deserved win for one of the standout players in the Arsenal Women’s team. The award is Walti’s second, having previously won in 2021.
“It’s beautiful,” Xhaka said afterwards. “It recognizes your own performance. But your own performance – without the team, without the coaching staff, nothing usually works.
“I’m overjoyed to have won for the second time in a row.
“I already said it on stage earlier that Manu and Zeki also deserved to win. The prize shows that you can get appreciation even without a trophy.”
“I can agree with Granit,” Walti added. “With our role in the games, it might be harder for us to win trophies like that.
“We’re not necessarily the scorers. We do the hidden work, the dirty work that you can’t see from the outside. I think it’s nice that players are rewarded with awards like this.
“On the other hand, we both know that there is a team behind it, both in the club and in the national team. They make a big contribution to us being able to play the way we do.
“It’s nice to win such a prize. At the same time, it also makes you hungry for more, especially in the club. That’s also my big goal this year with Arsenal.”