Who is the most popular African player in the Premier League?

With the new season well under way and the return of European competitions, as well as the fast-approaching start of the World Cup, there’s never been a better time to see our favourite footballing stars in competitive action. These players often transcend the realm of sport and become world-renowned celebrities - but who is the most popular off the pitch?

To find out, Seatpick scoured data surrounding the players in the 20 teams currently competing in the English Premier League, and these are the results:

The full data set can be found HERE.

We hope you find this release useful. If you do end up using it, we would appreciate a link https://seatpick.com/ to who commissioned the data. A link credit allows us to keep supplying you with future content that you may find useful.

The most popular African players in the Premier League

* An '=' represents a joint ranking

Seatpick can reveal that the most popular African player currently in the Premier League is Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah. Though far behind Ronaldo’s follower count, the Egyptian King still boasts an astounding 53 million followers. Salah has been an instrumental maestro for the Reds since his club-record signing in 2017, helping to lead them to Premier and Champions League glory with his efforts. Considered one of the greatest African players of all time, it is no surprise to see him as one of the Premier League’s most popular.

In second place is Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. The former Gabon international has been the centre of a couple headline transfers in recent times: first from Arsenal to Barcelona, and then back to the Premier League this year to play for Chelsea. He finishes with 13.4 million followers.

In third place is Riyad Mahrez, with 9.3 million followers. The Algerian winger helped Leicester City win the Premier League a few years ago, and is now an important part of Pep Guardiola’s star-studded Manchester City team. 

Chelsea’s Hakim Ziyech, who has recently returned to his international duties with Morocco, finishes in fourth with 6.4 million followers, and Arsenal’s Mohamed Elneny, the second Egyptian on the list, finishes in fifth, with 4.6 million.

The rest of the top 10 is dominated by Senegalese players: Chelsea’s Édouard Mendy and Kalidou Koulibaly in sixth and seventh respectively, as well as Everton’s Idrissa Gueye in ninth. West Ham United’s Algerian star Saïd Benrahma finishes in eighth and Liverpool’s Guinea international Naby Keïta shares ninth spot with Gueye.

The most popular players in the Premier League

Seatpick can reveal that Cristiano Ronaldo is the most popular player in the Premier League, with around 489 million followers. The Manchester United striker recently scored his 700th club goal, and is (along with Paris Saint-Germain’s Lionel Messi) among the most famous and decorated players of his era, if not of all time. To give you an idea of his popularity, the only Instagram account with more followers than Ronaldo’s … is Instagram’s itself. 

As seen above, Mo Salah takes second place, with 53.1 million followers.

Another Liverpool legend of the modern era, Philippe Coutinho, follows in third, with close to 25 million followers. Though “The Little Magician” has long left Anfield, he is still beloved by many Liverpool fans, with fond memories of his goals and abilities. He now plays under former teammate Steven Gerrard at Aston Villa, and though some have called into question his current form, it is no doubt that the Brazilian is still one of the Premier League’s most popular stars.

Thiago Silva, another Brazilian icon, is ranked fourth, with around 20 million followers. Manchester City’s Erling Haaland comes in fifth, with almost 20 million followers. 

Other notable findings:

- 6 out of the 20 most popular current PL players play for Brazil on an international level.

- Premier League players boast over 1.2 billion total followers when added together. This means that Cristiano Ronaldo’s following of 489 million makes up over 40% of the entire league’s!

- Manchester United is the PL team that has the largest number of players in the top 20 for popularity, with five. Their Instagram page is also the most popular team page in the PL, with 61.2 million followers. 

- The most popular goalkeeper in the PL is Manchester United’s David De Gea, with close to 14 million followers.

- The most popular manager in the PL is Everton’s Frank Lampard, with 5.8 million followers.

Methodology:

1. To find out which Premier League player is the most popular, Seatpick first collected data on every player for each of the 20 teams currently in the Premier League, using the Premier League’s official website.

2. With this seed list, they searched for each player’s account on Instagram and made a note of their follower numbers as they appear on their page. Players who do not have an Instagram account or whose account could not be found were left as ‘0’ and ‘N/A’.

3. The same method was used to find follower numbers for all the Premier League managers and official club pages.

4. All follower numbers were added up, both divided by teams and for the league as a whole as well.

5. A final ranking was made of the 20 most popular players in the Premier League based on their current number of Instagram followers. Their club and international teams were also noted down.

6. Players who are on loan for the season were counted as part of their current team. E.g., Conor Coady is currently playing for Everton on loan from Wolverhampton Wanderers, so he has been counted as an Everton player. 

7. All data was collected in October 2022 and is accurate as of then.

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