The much-anticipated ceremony for the 2019 Chinese Footballer of the Year Award was held in Beijing on Friday evening. As expected, Chinese forward Wu Lei, who currently plays for Espanyol in the Spanish La Liga, won the men's honor for a second straight year.

Wu was not in Beijing to receive his award trophy as he has been busy playing for his club in Spain. However, he sent across his reaction through a video which was played during the event.

In his video message, the 28-year-old footballer, who scored a crucial equalizer for his club against Spanish La Liga giants Barcelona earlier this month, said, "it is a great honor for me to be named the 2019 Chinese Footballer of the Year. The year of 2019 was a year full of challenges for me as I came to a brand new platform, which was also a higher one. Thanks a lot for the votes and the approval of me from the judges."

Incidentally, Wu, who had been the top scorer in the Chinese Super League (CSL) with 27 goals and had played a stellar role to help Shanghai SIPG won the CSL in 2018, was part of an 18-man shortlist that also featured Yan Junling and Elkeson. In 2018, he won the award after receiving 400 more votes than the runner-up. The talismanic striker has also scored four goals from his nine appearances for the Chinese national team.

The awards are based on the votes from the media. Xu Yang won the five-a-side footballer of the year award while Wang Shuang was chosen for the Chinese women's footballer of the year award.

The men's national team coach Li Tie, who is currently in Guangzhou training the squad, won the Chinese football coach of the year laurel. Zhu Chenjie was awarded as the Chinese Youth Footballer of the Year.