Tobi Amusan, Morocco joins Messi, Nadal in contention for 2023 Laureus World Sports Awards
The nominations for the 2023 Laureus World Sports Awards has been announced and it include not just the athletes who lit up the past 12 months, but some of the greatest of all time.
The global sporting award, first held in 2000, honours the greatest and most inspirational sporting triumphs of the year and showcases the work of Laureus Sport for Good.
Shortlists for seven categories (Sportswoman, Sportsman, Team, Breakthrough, Comeback, Action and Sport for Good) are created by votes from more than 1,000 sports media from over 70 countries while the shortlist for World Athlete of the Year with a Disability is provided by the International Paralympic Committee.
Broadcast around the world, the Awards also provides a global platform for supporting Laureus Sport for Good, by showcasing the incredible work done to transform young lives around the world.
While Lionel Messi, who won the World Cup with Argentina, Rafael Nadal, who ended 2022 alone at the top of the all-time list of men’s Grand Slam champions headlines the nomination list for the 24th edition, it includes Nigeria’s Tobi Amusan, Morocco men’s national football team, Kenya’s Boxgirls and South Africa’s Made For More.
SPORTSWOMAN OF THE YEAR
The race for the Laureus World Sportswoman of the Year Award includes two athletes who lit up the World Championships in Eugene, Oregon: Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce who became a five-time champion over 100m and Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone who added the world title to her Olympic crown with an unforgettable world record in the 400m hurdles.
At the World Aquatics Championships in Budapest, Katie Ledecky won four golds, taking her total to 22, a record for a female swimmer.
Alexia Putellas led FC Barcelona to a perfect season in the Spanish league and claimed a second Ballon d’Or.
Mikaela Shiffrin regained her overall title at the Alpine Ski World Cup and closed in on the all-time record for wins, while Iga Świątek emerged from 2022 as the undisputed No.1 in women’s tennis, winning the French Open and US Open.
SPORTSMAN OF THE YEAR
The nominees for the Laureus World Sportsman of the Year Award spent 2022 climbing to the very pinnacle of their sport.
Lionel Messi collected the one prize that had eluded him by leading Argentina to the World Cup.
Kylian Mbappé’s hat-trick in the final earned him the Golden Boot as the World Cup’s leading goalscorer.
Rafael Nadal ended 2022 alone at the top of the all-time list of men’s Grand Slam champions with 22 titles after victory in Australian Open and French Open.
Max Verstappen joins Messi and Nadal as past winners of this Award on the 2023 shortlist after defending his Formula One world title.
Mondo Duplantis broke the pole vault world record on three occasions and won world titles indoors and out while Steph Curry also made the cut for leading the Golden State Warriors to a fourth NBA championship in eight years.
Earlier on Tuesday, Nadal said Messi’s World Cup heroics should see him win the Laureus World Sportsman of the Year award.
“An honour to be nominated again to the Laureus Sportsman of the Year…but…this year…come on Lionel Messi you deserve it,” wrote Nadal on his Instagram story.
Even Nadal thinks Messi deserves to win sportsman of the year 🐐 pic.twitter.com/MIsPFZk4y0
— Eurosport (@eurosport) February 21, 2023
TEAM OF THE YEAR
The Nominees for the Laureus World Team of the Year Award include both serial winners and ground-breakers.
The Argentina Men’s Football Team won a third World Cup, but the first in a generation led by Lionel Messi.
No team has won the Champions League more than Real Madrid, who claimed their 14th title to go with another Spanish La Liga crown.
The Golden State Warriors’ fourth NBA championship in eight years ensured their legacy will last forever.
The Oracle Red Bull Racing ended the eight-year reign of Mercedes with a Max Verstappen-led victory in the Constructors’ Championship.
The France Men’s Rugby Team had not won the Six Nations Championship since the Grand Slam of 2010 – and they repeated that feat to reclaim the crown in style.
And there were no more dramatic winners than the England Women’s Football Team, who on home soil fulfilled their promise to become champions of Europe.
BREAKTHROUGH OF THE YEAR
The Laureus World Breakthrough of the Year Award identifies those athletes and teams who took a giant step forward in the past year.
For some, one big win lit up their name; for others, sustained excellence made for a changing of the guard at the top of their sport.
Two meteoric tennis talents are among the nominees: Carlos Alcaraz gave a preview of the next era in the men’s game, winning the US Open to end the year as the sport’s youngest-ever No.1-ranked player while Elena Rybakina won her first Grand Slam title at Wimbledon in the women’s game.
Scottie Scheffler won The Masters and tied for second at the US Open on his way to becoming golf’s No.1 while fellow American, Nathan Chen joined him on the list after adding Olympic gold to his world title.
Also nominated are the Morocco Men’s Football Team who captivated the world on their adventure to the semi-finals of the 2022 World Cup.
The heroics in Qatar also earned the Atlas Lions the title of ‘Mover of the Year’ by FIFA having won more points (142) in the football world’s governing body ranking than any other team since the end of 2021.
Tobi Amusan, who broke the 100m hurdles world record on the way to claiming Nigeria’s first-ever gold medal at the World Athletics Championships is the second female on the breakthrough list.
COMEBACK OF THE YEAR
Tiger Woods’ return at Augusta, 14 months after a car crash that crushed one of his feet leads the nominations for Laureus World Comeback of the Year.
Klay Thompson missed two entire seasons through injuries before returning to win his fourth NBA championship with the Golden State Warriors.
At the World Athletics Championships, there was no upset greater than Jake Wightman’s defeat of Jakob Ingebrigtsen in the 1500m final and Norway’s 21-year-old track superstar responded with gold in the 5,000m a few days later.
Francesco Bagnaia won his first MotoGP title from a seemingly impossible position – he trailed by 91 points in mid-season.
Annemiek van Vleuten started the Tour de France Femmes fighting illness and slumping to the back of the field, before fighting through the ranks to win it all.
Christian Eriksen collapsed on the field after suffering cardiac arrest during a Euro 2020 match for Denmark. In February 2022, he returned to the field in the Premier League for Brentford and later Manchester United.
ACTION SPORTSPERSON OF THE YEAR
Three surfers are nominated for the Laureus World Action Sportsperson of the Year Award, the province of sport’s daredevils, high-flyers and risk-takers.
Filipe Toledo of Brazil was world champion for the first time but for Stephanie Gilmore, a previous winner of this Award, it was world championship No.8, while big-wave specialist Justine Dupont continued to thrill in that most daring of disciplines.
At the Beijing Winter Olympics, freestyle skier Eileen Gu won two gold medals – in big air and halfpipe – while snowboarder Chloe Kim defended the halfpipe gold she had won as a teenager in 2018.
Skateboarder Rayssa Leal was still only 14 as she won Street gold at both the Summer X Games and the World Championships.
SPORTSPERSON OF THE YEAR WITH A DISABILITY
Diede de Groot completed back-to-back calendar Grand Slams to set a new standard in wheelchair tennis and earn her place among the nominees for the Laureus World Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability Award.
Catherine Debrunner broke world records in T53 100m, 200m, 400m and 800m on her home track in Switzerland, then moved up to marathon, winning on her debut in Berlin, and in London.
After a break of over two years from competitive swimming, New Zealand’s Cameron Leslie – who also competes in wheelchair rugby as a Wheel Black – won S4 100m freestyle gold at the World Para Swimming Championships.
At the Winter Paralympics in China, Declan Farmer led USA to a third consecutive gold medal in Ice Hockey and was the tournament’s top scorer; Jesper Saltvik Pedersen won four golds on the slopes; and the multi-sport phenomenon Oksana Masters added another chapter to her legend with double gold in the para biathlon.
SPORT FOR GOOD
Five inspirational programmes have also been shortlisted for the Laureus Sport for Good Award, given each year to an individual or organisation who, in the opinion of the members of the Laureus World Sports Academy, has made a significant contribution to transforming the lives of children and young people through sport.
This year these include a programme that uses boxing to challenge stereotypes and empower young women in Kenya (Boxgirls), a football project aimed at educating and elevating the homeless population in India (Slum Soccer), a programme whose mission is to make sport inclusive for people with disabilities in South Africa (Made For More).
Movement-based psychosocial support intervention developed by War Child, Save the Children and UNICEF the Netherlands, that uses physical activity to relieve stress in children affected by war or conflict, and which is particularly active supporting refugees from Ukraine in surrounding host nations (TeamUp); and a project in Germany that uses action sports to help orphaned and migrant children integrate into new communities (High Five) completes the category.
VOTING PROCEDURES
The Laureus World Sports Academy, a unique group of 71 sporting legends including Olympic champions, world record holders, athletes who changed the game, and the ultimate jury on sporting greatness votes for the winners in each shortlisted category.
The Academy also has the ability to grant discretionary awards, such as the Laureus Lifetime Achievement Award.
A global public vote determines the winner of the Laureus Sporting Moment of the Year award, which honours one inspiring story that encapsulates the power of sport inspire and bring people together.
All winners receives the unique Laureus Statuette specially crafted by Cartier with its representation of the striving human form.
The statuettes are 30cms high and weigh 2.5kgs. Each figure contains 670g of solid silver with a 650g gold finish base.
AFRICANS AT THE LAURELS AWARD
The Laureus World Sports Awards is no stranger to African athletes, Kenyan long-distance runner, Vivian Cheruiyot became the first athlete from the continent to win the prestigious award for Sportswoman of the Year in 2012.
Cheruiyot won after she claimed gold in the 5,000 and 10,000 meters finals at the 2011 World Athletics Championships in Daegu.
Ethiopia’s Genzebe Dibaba also achieved the feat in 2015 when she was rewarded for her 2014 season in which she set world indoor records for 1500m and 3000m as well as a world indoor best for two miles.
Despite losing the Sportsman of the Year to Novak Djokovic in 2019, Eliud Kipchoge took the Exceptional Achievement Award after taking 78 seconds off the world marathon record with his victory in Berlin.
Kipchoge earned nomination for the Sportsman of the Year again in 2020, this time losing to joint-winners Lewis Hamilton and Lionel Messi and also lost the 2022 award to Max Verstappen in the same category.
South Africans have also seen success at the Laureus Award, with Ernst van Dyk, Natalie du Toit and Oscar Pistorius winning Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability in 2006, 2010 and 2012 respectively.
The country’s rugby union team has won award for Team of the Year twice.
The Springboks’ first award came in 2008 after winning the 2007 Rugby World Cup while they won the second award in 2020 when they saw off competitions from Liverpool FC, Mercedes Formula One team, Spain men’s basketball team, Toronto Raptors, and the United States Women’s football team for winning the 2019 Rugby World Cup and 2019 Rugby Championship.
