IT’S THAT TIME of the year again.
RTÉ today released the shortlist for this year’s Sports Person of the Year Award, the Team of the Year award and a new award, the Manager of the Year.
The ceremony will be broadcast live on RTÉ One on Sunday, 18 December at 9.30pm.
So here, ladies and gentlemen, are your nominees: Darren Clarke, winner of the British Open; Michael Fennelly, GAA GPA All Star and Hurler of the Year; Sean O’Brien, Heineken Cup winner and ERC European player of the year; Katie Taylor, five-time European Amateur Boxing Champion; Rory McIlroy, world number two and US Open champion; John Joe Nevin, Olympic hopeful and World Amateur Boxing Bronze medalist; Kevin O’Brien, Ireland’s record breaking cricket hero; Alan Brogan, GAA GPA Footballer of the year; and Robbie Keane, the Republic of Ireland’s captain and record goalscorer.
The RTÉ Sports Team of the Year shortlist includes: European champions, Leinster; Dublin’s footballers; Ladies football kingpins, Cork; Ireland’s soccer team, Shamrock Rovers; Kilkenny’s hurlers; camogie champions, Wexford and the country’s Cricket World Cup heroes.
Brian Cody; Wexford camogie manager, JJ Doyle; Hoops boss, Michael O’Neill; IABI High Performance Unit coach, Billy Walsh; the Heineken Cup winning Joe Schmidt; Giovanni Trapattoni; Dublin football chief Pat Gilroy and Cheltenham Festival champion trainer, Willie Mullins are in the mix for the inaugural manager of the year award.
Trap won the Philips Manager of the Year award yesterday.
The winners of the RTÉ prizes will be selected by Donnybrook sports journalists, editorial staff and broadcasters.
But who do you think should win the big one, sports person of the year?
…..some leadership skills….well deserved
Traitor. No Irish man should accept that.
@Sean Barry: no Irish man should play for England!
@Sean Barry: ah yes. He’s captain of 1 day teams. Integral to transformation of their culture. On millions a yr from this role and he should turn down meaningless platitudes?
But can he graze his sheep in Stephens green ??
@Ger Lyons: trafalger square
@Ger Lyons: Trafalgar square
@Parnells Eighty-Seven: Trafalgar Square is not even half as leafy as Stephen’s Green so he will end up with really lean lamb.
As they say never look ‘a gift horse in the mouth”he plays cricket for an english team like many people who are not from that country like Andrew Strauss ,Ted Dexter and many many more,he was selected to do so and is a damn good player
For England old chap