The curtains have been raised and the Hockey Stars have been revealed! The much coveted Player of the Year title has been won by Lidewij Welten and Robert Van Der Horst from the Netherlands Hockey Team, for Female and Male respectively. The pair made their country proud by bagging the prestigious Player of the Year awards together.
Lidewij Welten has been a winner from the start. A star midfielder, Welten has taken her team to great heights ensuring it is one of the top teams in Women’s Hockey. Her skills in the field are highly impressive. In addition she has a list of accolades to her name; two gold medals in the Olympics and a World Cup title, and that too at the age of 25.
Robert Van Der Horst has shown his hockey skills numerous times. He is one of the most experienced players in his team. Winning the EuroHockey Championships 2015 by a 6-1 score against Germany was made fairly easy for the Dutch Hockey team, thanks to Van Der Horst.
There were a lot of highly acclaimed hockey stars nominated for the Player of the Year award. Mi-Hyun Park from Korea was also successful in scoring a place for the nomination of the much-revered Player of the Year. Park has an impressive cap tally of 227 and is the most experienced player in the Korean Hockey Team (Females). She has played a significant role in taking her team forward and securing it a place in the Olympics 2016, which are to be held in Rio this year. With the assistance of Park, the Korean team was successful in achieving some major victories. They won the Asian Championships 2014 and continued to impress everyone at the FINTRO Hockey World League Semi-Final in Belgium by taking home the silver.
Akashdeep Singh, one of Asia’s finest rising stars in the Hockey arena, has proved time and again that he is in fact one of the best Hockey players out there. Therefore, it came as no surprise when he was nominated as the Rising Star of the Year. His performance was highly appreciated in the Hero Hockey World League Final as India won a bronze medal in the match against Netherlands.
| Title | Winner |
| Player of the Year-Female | Lidewij Welten |
| Player of the Year-Male | Robert Van Der Horst |
| Goalkeeper of the Year-Female | Joyce Sombroek |
| Goalkeeper of the Year-Male | David Harte |
| Rising Star of the Year-Female | Lily Owsley |
| Rising Star of the Year-Male | Christopher Ruhr |
| Coach of the Year-Female | Karen Brown |
| Coach of the Year-Male | Craig Fulton |
| Umpire of the Year-Female | Michelle Joubert |
| Umpire of the Year-Male | Nathan Stagno |
