Who are the Indian players to have won the FIH Hockey Stars Awards?
PR Sreejesh and Savita Punia were among the Indian players nominated for the FIH Hockey Stars Awards this time around
Following a remarkable run at Tokyo 2020, six Indian players were nominated for the International Hockey Federation’s (FIH) Hockey Stars Awards.
The nominated include India men's and women's team goalkeepers PR Sreejesh and Savita Punia respectively, who put in outstanding performances at Tokyo 2020. The duo have been nominated for the ‘FIH Goalkeeper of the Year’ in the men’s and women’s categories.
Harmanpreet Singh and Gurjit Kaur have been nominated for the ‘FIH Player of the Year’ award in the men's and women's categories respectively while young talents Vivek Sagar Prasad (men's) and Sharmila Devi (women's) are in the running for the ‘FIH Rising Star’ awards.
The nominations for the awards were decided on the basis of players' performances from January 2020 till the completion of Tokyo 2020. Voting will decided the winners in respective categories in late September or early October.
Let us take a look at the Indian players who have won FIH Awards honour earlier.
Manpreet Singh
India men's hockey team captain Manpreet Singh became the first Indian to win the FIH Player of Year award in 2019. He beat Belgium’s Arthur van Doren and Lucas Villa of Argentina to bag the honour.
Manpreet had accumulated a total of 35.2 per cent of combined votes -- from National Associations, media, fans and players -- while Van Doren received 19.7 per cent of the votes and Villa garnered 16.5 per cent to finish third in the list.
Under his captaincy, India had finished fifth at the 2018 Men's World Cup in Bhubaneswar. He also led the side to the finals of the 2019 Sultan Azlan Shah Cup and won the Olympic Test Event in Tokyo.
Vivek Sagar Prasad
Rising Indian midfielder Vivek Sagar Prasad was named the 2019 FIH Men's Rising Star of the Year.
He beat Argentina’s Maico Casella and Blake Govers of Australia to take the accolade with 34.5 per cent of the combined votes.
The midfielder is also the second youngest player to represent India. He had scored six goals across all tournaments in 2019 and was awarded the Best Young Player of the tournament at the FIH Men's Series Finals.
Lalremsiami
India women's team forward Lalremsiami was named as the 2019 FIH Women’s Rising Star of the Year.
She grabbed the honours ahead of Argentina’s Julieta Jankunas and Frederique Matla of the Netherlands.
The forward had hogged the limelight at the Vitality Hockey Women’s World Cup in 2018 and went on to cement her place in the side since then. She has also been the top goal-scorer in a test series against Korea in 2017 and against Spain in 2019.