Costa Rican Keylor Navas candidate to best goalkeeper of the year in Europe

Portuguese Rui Patricio, Italian Gianluigi Buffon, Slovenian Jan Oblak and Costa Rican Keylor Navas will compete for Europe’s best goalkeeper of the year award 2016.

This is the first time Navas is nominated to this award, having been nominated before to best goalkeeper of the Spanish League, the Facebook Awards, and he was also among the candidates to best goalkeeper in Brazil 2014 World Cup.

30 goals received in 39 games and 16 matches without receiving a goal is what earned Keylor Navas his nomination. In comparison, Buffon received 24 goals in 45 games and had 26 matches without any goals, Oblak defended the archery without receiving a goal 29 times, and in 48 games he received 29 goals; finally Rui Patricio received 39 goals in 47 matches and in 22 matches received no goals.

In total there’s 40 nominees in the different soccer positions 4 goalkeepers, 12 defenses, 12 midfielders and 12 forwards, all selected by UEFA based on the players’ participation in their respective soccer clubs and national teams during 2016.

The winner is selected by fan votes in the UEFA page. Voting is open through January 3rd and the results will be published January 5th.

Good news in combat sports:

Costa Rica celebrates newly crowned judo world champion in category Female Master Kenia Rodriguez. Rodriguez competed in the Judo World Championship that took place in Fort Lauderdale, U.S.A. and defeated Bajarmaa Ledgen from Mongolia to earn the gold medal.

Making history, Maria Jose Calderon won the first silver medal in taekwondo for Costa Rica in the XI WTF (World Taekwondo Federation) World Taekwondo Junior Championship 2016 which was celebrated in Burnaby, Canada. Calderon competed in the under 45 kg category.