Martin Petrov has been named as Bulgaria's Player
of the Year (AFP)
Club Atletico de Madrid winger Martin Petrov has been named
as Bulgaria's Player of the Year ahead of Tottenham Hotspur's Dimitar
Berbatov and Aston Villa FC's Stilian Petrov.
First honour
The 27-year-old came out on top in a poll of 161 Bulgarian journalists
to take the award for the first time in his career. The honour will be
all the more welcome as the player has been out of action for the last
two months with a knee ligament injury.
Thanks all round
The winger made his mark in 2006 by scoring four goals in three UEFA EURO
2008T qualifiers for Bulgaria but he was quick to share the credit for
his success, saying: "I want to thank all my team-mates in the national
team and at Atletico. I won the award because of their help. I would like
also to thank my family for the great support in the two months since
I got injured. I hope I will back as soon as possible to give the fans
plenty of reasons to celebrate."
Other awards
In other awards, Stanimir Stoilov was named coach of the year after taking
PFC Levski Sofia into the UEFA Champions League group stage, Berbatov
won the awards for fans' player of the year and forward of the year, Levski's
Stanislav Angelov was midfielder of the year and his team-mate Georgi
Petkov was goalkeeper of the year. Another Levski player, Valeri Domovchiyski,
was named as young player of the year while Todor Radomirov of PFC Spartak
Varna won the fair play award.
