Zambia’s Barbra Banda is BBC Women’s Footballer of the Year
Zambia and Orlando Pride forward Barbra Banda has been voted BBC Women’s Footballer of the Year. She received the most votes from readers of the BBC Sport website after a five-player shortlist was announced last month.
The shortlist, based on performances from September 2023 to August 2024, was selected by a large panel of experts involved in football around the world, including coaches, players, administrators, and non-BBC journalists.
“I am shocked and surprised to have this award right by my side,” the 24-year-old told BBC Sport. “I would like to thank the people who voted and everyone who has played a part in my life and my career—my family, my national team in Zambia and especially the Pride team. It is for everyone.”
In 10 years of the BBC Women’s Footballer of the Year award, Banda is one of only three Africans to have ever been nominated, and the second to win it after Nigerian Asisat Oshoala in 2015.
What has she achieved at club level?
Banda became the first Zambian woman to play football in Europe when she signed for Spanish side Logrono in October 2018, going on to score 16 goals in 28 matches for the club. Little more than a year later, in early 2020, she joined Chinese Super League outfit Shanghai Shengli where she won the Golden Boot in her first season with twice the number of goals as the second-ranked player.
In March of this year, Banda became the second-most expensive women’s signing in history—behind Zambia team-mate Racheal Kundananji — when she joined U.S. club, Orlando Pride from Chinese Shanghai Shengli for $740,000 (£581,000).
Banda scored 13 goals for Orlando Pride in the 2024 National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) regular season, despite only joining in March, and four goals in the playoffs, including the winning goal in the championship final on Saturday as Orlando Pride won their maiden title.
She was also named Most Valuable Player (MVP) in the NWSL. Spain and Barcelona midfielder Aitana Bonmati came second in the voting, while USA and Portland Thorns forward Sophia Smith finished third. Norway and Barcelona winger Caroline Graham Hansen and USA and San Diego Wave defender Naomi Girma were also on the shortlist.
“My aim always is to score because I love scoring,” said Banda. “But it all starts from practice, having good training sessions, and good talks with the coaches and teammates. It has not been easy, but I think hard work and consistency has really helped.”
The Zambia captain, who came 12th in the 2024 Women’s Ballon d’Or, is a former professional boxer who won all of her five bouts before switching focus to football. “Growing up in Zambia has never been easy, especially as a young girl. It is so difficult for us to get into sport like football,” she said.
What has she achieved as an international footballer?
Banda made her senior international debut for Zambia in 2016. At the Tokyo Olympic Games in 2021, she became the first woman to score two hat-tricks in the same Olympic football tournament.
Three years later in Paris, the Zambia captain scored four goals, including a first-half hat-trick against Australia, to become Africa’s all-time top scorer—male or female—in Olympic football history with 10 goals. At the 2023 Women’s World Cup, she scored in Zambia’s first ever win at the tournament. Her strike also marked the 1,000th goal in the Women’s World Cup.
Off the pitch, she launched the Barbra Banda Foundation in Zambia in 2021, which aims to alleviate poverty, promote equality through sport, and help raise awareness for issues affecting girls. She has spoken openly about the challenges of growing up as a young girl in Zambia.
“Parents never used to believe that women could play football so it was a challenge. My mum was not in support of it, but when women’s football started being recognised in Zambia she came to understand and let me do what I love doing most.”
Pride head coach Seb Hines told BBC Sport: “It is great to see Barbra getting acknowledged for what she has done, not only for our club but for African football. She is super humble and a good person and that means a lot to us to have good people in our team. She is a team player and, for all of the accolades that she has won and all of the goalscoring records that she has, she puts the team first.”
Source: BBC
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