The five-member jury for the Sportstar Aces Awards met here on Saturday to deliberate on the nominations.
The jury, which consists of former India cricket captain Sunil Gavaskar (who is the chairman), former India hockey captain, M.M. Somaya, shooter Anjali Bhagwat, Olympian long jumper Anju Bobby George, and N. Ram, the chairman of The Hindu Group Publishing, discussed the names of the candidates for 17 award categories.
“We had a tough time because the performances (of different athletes) were on a par for (various) awards,” Gavaskar said.
Anju agreed, saying: “We considered the performances of 2018, but in some cases, we also had to take previous performances into consideration. There were close competition between some athletes.”
Somaya, who led the Indian hockey team in the Seoul Olympics in 1988, was happy to see sportsmen from various disciplines being talked about.
“In the last couple of years, India has excelled in various disciplines and not just cricket. In the Asian Games and the Commonwealth Games, we fared well in many disciplines. The choice was good and it was good that the committee had a broad outlook,” the former hockey captain said.
