Jamie Dwyer nominated for World Player of the Year award
Kookaburras champion and Queenslander Jamie Dwyer has been given a further opportunity to stake his claim as the world’s best hockey player after today being nominated for the FIH World Player of the year award.
Dwyer has been nominated as one of five players to win the award. In a sign of the strength of Australia’s men’s team the Kookaburras have two players nominated within the five shortlisted players, with 24 year old Eddie Ockenden also nominated to win the award for the first time.
Dwyer and Ockenden will battle against the Netherlands’ Teun de Nooijer (3 time winner of the award) and Germany’s Moritz Furste and their captain Max Muller.
Dwyer is a four time winner of the award (2004, 2007, 2009, 2010) and has won the award more times than any other player in the world.
For Ockenden, this is the first time he has ever been nominated however he was the winner of the 2008 world young player of the year award, a title also won by Dwyer in 2002.
The Hockeyroos do not have any players nominated for either women’s category.
2011 has been an indifferent year for Dwyer having suffered a serious knee injury earlier in the year while playing for his club side in the Netherlands. The injury required surgery and saw him sidelined for 3 months. He made his comeback at the Oceania Cup against New Zealand in October and has steadily improved in each game since. He has been one of the most important players for the Kookaburras at the current 2011 Champions Trophy and has scored three goals in two games to date.
Ockenden has also enjoyed a successful year. With the Kookaburras suffering a number of injuries throughout the year it has been Ockenden who has really stepped up to be one of our most consistent performers.
Young Kookaburras defender Matthew Swann has also been nominated for the men’s junior player of the year award. Swann has made a steady rise into the team since debuting in 2009 and has been part of the 2009 and 2010 Champions Trophy victories as well as the 2010 World Cup and Commonwealth Games gold medals.
Nominations for this prestigious prize have been put together by a panel of selected coaches from many of the world’s best international teams, including Max Caldas (Netherlands), Adam Commens (Australia), Carlos Retegui (Argentina), Lee Bodimeade (USA), Michael Behrmann (Germany), Danny Kerry (England & Great Britain) and Mark Hager (New Zealand) on the women’s side, and Ric Charlesworth (Australia), Markus Weise (Germany), Jason Lee (England & Great Britain), Pablo Lombi (Argentina), Shane McLeod (New Zealand) and Colin Batch (Belgium) on the men’s side. The winners will be determined from these shortlists by a vote amongst the players.
The winners of the men’s awards will be announced on Saturday 10 December at the Champions Trophy in Auckland, New Zealand.
The 2011 FIH All-Star teams will be decided by public vote on the FIH Website between 12th and 21st December.
