KATHMANDU, September 4: Footballers have dominated the list of nominees for the NSJF Pulsar Sports Award, which will be held in the capital on September 11. Five footballers, including players and coaches, were nominated in four different categories of the sports award on Sunday.
Striker of national women’s football team Sabitra Bhandari has been nominated for the female player of the year, while goalkeeper of national men’s team Kiran Kumar Limbu has been named for the male player of the year.
Likewise, Ananta Tamang, a national men’s team member is named for the youth player of the year, while national men’s team head coach Gyotoku Koji and Megh Raj KC are the among the five nominees in the best coach category.
Footballers dominates nominees list for Sports Award
Meanwhile, national men’s team winger Sujal Shrestha has been already included in the people’s choice category.
Athletics comes behind football with four nominees in three categories. Athletes Kanchi Maya Koju and Saraswati Bhattarai have been nominated in female player of the year, while Som Bahadur Kumal is included in the male player of the year. Likewise, Puspa Raj Ojha has been nominated as the coach of the year. Koju was also named in the people’s choice category earlier.
Likewise, cricket has three nominees: national team members Sharad Vesawkar, Dipendra Singh Airee, and Coach Jagat Tamata have been included in the male player of the year, youth player of the year, and best coach of the year categories respectively. Airee was also named in the people’s choice earlier.
Meanwhile Archery’s Gyanu Awale and Nangsal Tamang are other nominees in the female player of the year category. Likewise, Man Bahadur Shrestha of volleyball and shuttler Ratna Jit Tamang are among the five nominees for the male player of the year. Beside cricketer Airee and football’s Tamang, judoka Manita Shrestha Pradhan, weightlifter Kamala Shrestha, and national women’s volleyball player Pratibha Mali are other nominees in the youth player of the year. Similarly, Kiran Thapa of badminton is the other nominee among the five in the coach of the year category.
A seven-member selection committee of Nepal Sports Journalists Forum (NSJF), the organizer of the event, under coordination of its secretary Raju Ghising, announced the nominees. According to Ghising, the players were selected on the basis of their performance in domestic and international tournaments throughout the year 2073 BS.
The other categories are Lifetime Achievement award, Special award, Para-athlete of the Year award and People’s Choice award. The winner of the people’s choice category will be announced on the basis of the votes they get from SMS voting and Facebook likes while the winners of all other categories will be decided by the selection committee.
Meanwhile, there won’t be any nomination in the Lifetime Achievement, Special and Para-athlete categories as their winners will be announced on the awards day itself.
Judoka Phupu Lhamu Khatri, athlete Kanchi Maya Koju, swimmer Gaurika Singh, footballer Sujal Shrestha and cricketer Dipendra Singh Airee are the nominees for the people’s choice award.
