Ali Ashfaq

Ali Ashfaq (born 6 September 1985), nicknamed "Dhagandei", is a Maldivian professional footballer who plays for Maldivian club Green Street. He is a forward and serves as captain for Maldives. He is widely regarded as one of the best players in South Asian region along with Sunil Chhetri and Bhaichung Bhutia. He is noted for his strength, amazing dribbling skills and the capability of beating any sort of defenders, according to many coaches. He is a free-kick specialist and a clinical finisher. His trademark style of scoring is beating couple of defenders and rounding off the keeper to score. He is considered as the best Maldivian footballer ever most notably when he was named as the "World's 2nd Best Top Goal Scorer" in 2013 by IFFHS. He was also named as South Asia's Best Player in 2014 by eultimategoal.com. In March 2016, Ashfaq completed his 50th goal mark for Maldives national team.Ashfaq had been noticed by some big clubs in Europe like Portugal's S.L. Benfica, FC Porto, Turkish club Bursaspor, and many other clubs within Asia, but he refused those offers. However, he is the first ever Maldivian footballer to play abroad, and the only player to win a title with a foreign club. In November 2003, Ashfaq was honored with the most prestigious awards a Maldivian footballer would get, in the age of 18 – Maldivian Footballer of the Year and Golden Boot Award in 2003 season. With Club Valencia, New Radiant, VB Sports Club and PDRM FA, he has won Dhivehi League ten times, six FA Cup, four President's Cup, two Cup Winners' Cup, three Charity Shield, two POMIS Cup and one Malaysia Premier League. Ashfaq began his professional career with Club Valencia, where he played for five years. In 2001, he won his first trophy, Dhivehi League. He was crowned as the top scorer of Maldivian football season in 2003, 2004 and 2005 consecutively. In 2006, he signed for New Radiant and won various trophies and he was named as Haveeru Best Footballer of the year in 2007 in his two-year pe