{"id":670578,"date":"2026-05-28T18:21:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-28T18:21:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/670578\/"},"modified":"2026-05-28T18:21:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-28T18:21:12","slug":"bbc-football-awards-premier-league-wsl-scottish-premiership-and-efl-winners-announced","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/670578\/","title":{"rendered":"BBC Football Awards: Premier League, WSL, Scottish Premiership and EFL winners announced"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Granit Xhaka, anyone?published at 19:11 BST<\/p>\n<p>19:11 BST<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-fxb76l-Paragraph e14e9ror4\">Signing of the season<\/p>\n<p>      <img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Granit Xhaka\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/bac62003-e0e6-4b39-bc88-e78d28499e30.jpg.webp\"  width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" class=\"ssrcss-egie1y-Image edrdn950\"\/>Image source, Getty Images<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Could it be Granit Xhaka, who&#8217;s our Premier League Signing of the Season? <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He turned plenty of heads last summer when he left Champions League side Bayer Leverkusen to join newly-promoted Sunderland.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">But less than 12 months on, Xhaka\u2019s decision to join the Black Cats has been vindicated. He has rediscovered his best form to help the Premier League newcomers secure European qualification for the first time in 53 years.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">After being named club captain upon his arrival at the Stadium of Light, the Switzerland international has led by example both on and off the pitch.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In total, he featured in 34 of a possible 38 Premier League matches, registering one goal and six assists in what proved to be a truly historic season for the Black Cats.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">When Xhaka leads Sunderland out in the Europa League next season, his decision to move to the North East will no longer seem as bewildering as it did last summer.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Appearances: 34<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Assists: 6<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Goals: 1<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Granit Xhaka, anyone?published at 19:11 BST 19:11 BST Signing of the season Image source, Getty Images Could it&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":670579,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[403,99],"class_list":["post-670578","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670578","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=670578"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/670578\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/670579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=670578"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=670578"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=670578"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}