And the nominees are ...

AUSTRALIAN MATILDAS

MANY column inches might have been devoted to the Socceroos in 2010 as they chased World Cup glory in South Africa, but any true soccer fan will tell you that the real Australian soccer story of the year came in China, being delivered by their female equivalents. The Matildas did what the boys failed to do in 2007, winning the regions most prestigious trophy, the Asian Cup. In the toughest of the two groups at the tournament, the Matildas were pitched against heavyweights China and South Korea, as well as Vietnam.

The girls took on Japan and Tom Sermannis team refused to wilt, keeping a clean sheet for 90 minutes as Kate Gills strike on the brink of half-time proved enough to secure a place in the fi nal against North Korea. Despite terrible conditions, 16-year-old Sam Kerr put Australia ahead before Jo Yun-Mi levelled things up, with the match ultimately going to penalties. Not a single Australian missed a spot kick, but Yun Song-Mi missed, handing Sermannis side the trophy. SEBASTIAN HASSETT

AUSTRALIAN KOOKABURRAS

THEIR most recent triumph involved an 8-0 thrashing of host nation India to take the gold medal at the Delhi Commonwealth Games. There is no doubt the Kookaburras will also be the team to beat at the London Olympics in 2012. They became the fi rst team to claim the treble of the World Cup, Champions Trophy and Commonwealth Games gold in the same year. Now that our cricketers have stumbled, the Kookaburras are also surely Australias greatest sporting team and one of the most successful teams Australian sport has known. They have won a medal at each of the past fi ve Olympic Games, including gold in Athens in 2004. Prior to that, they fi nished fourth at the 1984 and 1988 Olympics. They fi rst won the World Cup in 1986, came third in 1990 and 1994, were runners-up in 2002 and 2006 and won again this year. They have taken out the Champions Trophy the past three years and have won the past four Commonwealth Games gold medals. DANIEL LEWIS

COLLINGWOOD

MANY thought the Magpies were a fair gap behind the best sides of 2009, Geelong and St Kilda, as well as the menacing Western Bulldogs. But Collingwood rallied behind coach Mick Malthouse and they came up with a formula to unsettle the opposition with fi erce pressure in the forward line.

The Pies won 17 matches during the regular season to fi nish on top of the ladder, two points clear of Geelong thanks to a draw with Melbourne. Many critics questioned whether Collingwood had enough stars to go all the way, but that analysis was fraught with danger this unit was all about the team, rather than the individual. Of course, there were some standout displays, none greater than Dane Swan, who put a superb 2009 behind him to reach even greater heights in 2010. Save for a near-catastrophic second half against St Kilda in the drawn grand fi nal, the Pies were all brilliant in September, none more so than in the grand fi nal replay triumph. SEBASTIAN HASSETT

QUEENSLAND STATE OF ORIGIN

Not content with simply completing a fifth successive interstate triumph over NSW, Mal Meningas rugby league team produced a series clean sweep.

Meningas maxim since he took over the coaching job in 2006 has been loyalty, and once again he kept team changes to a minimum and placed trust in the men who had succeeded in the past. Even the fact that two of the three games were played in Sydney and regulars Justin Hodges and Steve Price were missing with injury could not prevent Queensland dominating. Full-back Billy Slater was judged man of the series. Holding a 1-0 lead going into the second game in Brisbane, the Maroons drove the knife in at Suncorp Stadium, winning 34-6. Meninga was then given the perfect 50th birthday present as the series was wrapped up at ANZ Stadium 23-18. No team in Origins 30-year history had won fi ve series in a row before this band of Bananabenders. CHRIS BARRETT

ST GEORGE ILLAWARRA

OFTEN considered underachievers, the Dragons broke a 31-year drought when they defeated the Sydney Roosters in the NRL grand fi nal. St George last won a rugby league fi rst-grade title in 1979, and not even a merger with Illawarra in 1999, handing the new super club a super roster, gave the Dragons success. Their inability to turn their wonderful squad on paper into one good enough to be engraved on the NRL trophy became not so much a monkey on their back but a fully grown gorilla. Enter coach Wayne Bennett, who had steered the Brisbane Broncos to six premierships. Many thought Bennett would falter out of his comfort zone, under the pressure of being the coach of the most famous colours in rugby league. It certainly appeared that way when his side bowed out in 2009, losing twice in consecutive fi nals after winning the minor premiership. They have been labelled chokers many times along the way. But after the 32-8 victory over the Roosters, those names will never hurt them again. PAUL SUTTOR

TEAM VODAFONE

IT IS the powerhouse team with the red and silver cars that dominates V8 racing.

Drivers Jamie Whincup and Craig Lowndes are the public faces of TeamVodafone.

Entering the V8 Supercars competition in 2003, the team won the drivers championship with Whincup, now 27, in 2008 and 2009.

Driving together, Lowndes and Whincup also claimed Australians greatest motor sport event, Bathurst, in 2006, 2007 and 2008.

Lowndes, 36, teamed up with Mark Skaife to win Phillip Island and Bathurst. On the Gold Coast last weekend, Lowndes and new partner Andy Priaulx came second in the Saturday 300-kilometre race while Whincup and Owen won the Sunday race. With just three more events to go in the 2010 V8 Supercars season, Whincup is second on the drivers championship and Lowndes third. DANIEL LEWIS

COACH PERFORMANCE OF THE YEAR

WAYNE BENNETT WAYNE

Bennett confi rmed himself as the greatest coach in premiership history by overseeing the Dragons fi rst grand fi nal win since 1979. The victory, a 32-8 defeat of the Sydney Roosters, came in just Bennetts second season with St George Illawarra. It was Bennetts seventh grand fi nal success, adding to the six the master coach won in the 21 seasons he had charge of the Brisbane Broncos. By achieving the feat with the Dragons, he joined a select band of coaches to have won premierships at more than one club. Under Bennett, St George Illawarra has been the most consistent team in the NRL for the past two seasons and also won the 2009 and 2010 minor premierships. This year Bennett altered the teams preparations to ensure it peaked at the right time of the season and got the result fans had been waiting 31 years for. It was also the fi rst premiership win by the club since St George and Illawarra merged in 1999 and cements the future of the joint venture. GLENN JACK

RIC CHARLESWORTH

WHEN his mens hockey team thrashed host nation India 8-0 to claim the gold medal at the New Delhi Commonwealth Games, coach Ric Charlesworth was asked if he was fi nally happy. Im temporarily pleased, came the reply. There can be no doubt that Charlesworths nit-picking perfectionism is one of the reasons why the Kookaburras are the worlds best hockey team. The triumph in Delhi resulted in the Kookaburras becoming the fi rst hockey team to claim the treble of the World Cup, Champions Trophy and Commonwealth Games gold within the same year. Before taking over the mens side in 2009, Charlesworth had seven years as coach of Australias womens team (1993-2000). In that time they won two Olympic gold medals, two World Cups, four Champions Trophies and a Commonwealth Games gold. DANIEL LEWIS

MICHAEL MALTHOUSE

PREMIERSHIP glory in 2010 wasnt part of the script for Mick Malthouse. If it was, Collingwood would never have appointed Nathan Buckley as his successor for the 2012 season. Given two years before his senior coaching days were ended, few could foresee that Malthouse wasnt done with yet. Having seen St Kilda take the competition by storm on the back of forward pressure, Malthouse thought the idea was a good one but that he could make it better. Drilling into his players that unrelenting four-quarter pressure would be too much to bear for even the top teams, Collingwood cantered to the minor premiership before starting the fi nals with two huge wins over the Western Bulldogs and Geelong. The Magpies were set to claim the fl ag after dominating the fi rst half of the grand fi nal against the Saints, who somehow dug their way back into the match, forcing a draw and a replay seven days later. Malthouse asked his players to redouble their forward pressure in the replay and they duly delivered. SEBASTIAN HASSETT

PETER MOODY

THERE was not much more Melbourne horse trainer Peter Moody could have done in 2010.

He won the Melbourne premiership, was the leading independent trainer in the country and prepared horse of the year Typhoon Tracy. Its a long way from Charleville in central Queensland to the top echelon of Australian racing but Moody has made that journey. He worked with Tommy Smith and Peter Hayes before being Bill Mitchells right-hand man for 10 years. He took out his trainers licence in 2001 and was an immediate success, winning the Victoria Derby with Amalfi . However, 2010 was Moodys best year. He has established a great combination with jockey Luke Nolen and week in, week out the pair dominated Melbourne racing. Moody trained 82 winners in Melbourne last season, nearly double that of his nearest rival. He trained 194 winners at a strike rate of 22.4 per cent. CHRIS ROOTS

GAI WATERHOUSE

RACINGS first lady Gai Waterhouse didnt have her best year but 2010 provided some signifi - cant milestones in her career. She became the fi rst woman to train 100 group 1 winners in Australia, joining her father Tommy Smith, plus Bart Cummings and Lee Freedman in an elite club, when Herculian Prince won the Metropolitan in October. It was one of seven group 1 winners for the season and the second in a series of four winners at the top level in four weeks during the spring. Descarado would give Waterhouse a fi rst Caulfi eld Cup to provide a high point of the year, after the gun trainer described last season as disastrous. She fi nished third on the Sydney trainers premiership behind Peter Snowden and Chris Waller after winning it the year before. CHRIS ROOTS

JANE WOODLANDS THOMPSON

THIS year Jane Woodlands- Thompson assembled a team that was fi nally too good for all the others in the trans-Tasman ANZ Championship, the worlds top club netball competition. Her Adelaide Thunderbirds downed powerhouse New Zealand side Waikato/Bay of Plenty Magic, boasting Silver Ferns legend Irene van Dyk as shooter, in the grand fi nal to win the clubs fi rst championship. In the fi nals it also knocked out the NSW Swifts, who had created history by going through the regular season undefeated.

Under Woodlands-Thompson, the Thunderbirds were second in 2009 and third in 2008, when the semi-professional trans-Tasman competition began. Her tall and highly physical 2010 squad included Australian stars such as Natalie von Bertouch and Moonia Gerrard, as well as imports Geva Mentor from England and Carla Borrego from Jamaica. DANIEL LEWIS

YOUNG PERFORMER OF THE YEAR

JESSICA WATSON

SAILING

AT JUST 16, Queenslander Jessica Watson stole the heart of the nation when she unoffi cially became the youngest person ever to sail solo around the world. Having covered 38,000 kilometres over 210 days at sea, an emotional Watson arrived back in Sydney on May 15, 2010, three days before her 17th birthday. She said she had fought fears associated with boredom and loneliness, but didnt consider herself a hero. Im an ordinary girl who believed in a dream and you dont have to be someone special or anything special to achieve something amazing, she said. You just have to have the dream, believe in it and work hard. The teenager had a dogged determination to achieve her dream and from Sydney she headed towards northern New Zealand, then to Fiji, Samoa, South America and South Africa, then sailed the fi nal leg back to Australia. Watson had done no solo sailing before her voyage.

MELISSA WU

DIVING POCKET-rocket Melissa Wu made history at the 2008 Beijing Olympics when she became the youngest Australian (at 16) to win an Olympic medal in diving, taking silver in the synchronised 10-metre platform. But at this years Commonwealth Games she went one step better, winning gold in the same event with partner Alexandra Croak. With a little bit more luck, she would have grabbed gold in the biggest challenge in diving the individual 10-metre platform after her score of 369.50 was just edged out by that of Malaysian Pandelela Rinong Pamg (371.05). Wus success at the Commonwealth Games came four months after she claimed bronze at the prestigious World Cup meet in China. JULIAN TRANTINO

TOMMY OAR

SOCCER

THE talented winger came agonisingly close to becoming the youngest Australian to go to a World Cup when he was selected but later overlooked in the initial 31-man squad for South Africa.

Oar had only made his full league debut in October last year with Brisbane Roar. But such was his staggering ascent that in March, Oar was offered a trial with Dutch top-league side FC Utrecht. It topped off a memorable month for Oar, after he was named the best young player of the 2009-10 A-League season and made his international debut in Australias 1-0 win over Indonesia in the 2011 Asian Cup qualifi er. After a successful trial with FC Utrecht, Oar promptly ended his two outstanding seasons with Brisbane to better his career in Holland on a multi-million-dollar move. He made his fi rst appearance for his new club in mid-July when he was subbed on in the 89th minute in FC Utrechts 4-0 win over K.F Tirana in the UEFA Europa League. Oars debut came in late August in his sides 4-0 loss to reigning champion FC Twente. JULIAN TRANTINO

ALETHEA SEDGMAN

SHOOTING

ALETHEA Sedgman, 16, broke the countrys goldmedal shooting drought earlier this month. The year 11 schoolgirl from Arapiles, near Horsham in western Victoria, snatched victory in the womens 50-metre rifl e three positions event, landing her teams fi rst gold of a Commonwealth Games shooting competition. It was a remarkable feat, given the youngest of Australias Delhi Games gold medallists only took up shooting four years ago after visiting the range with her father, a recreational shooter.

Sedgman joined the senior shooting ranks late last year and although she toured the world on this years World Cup circuit, this was her fi rst major victory. Its really demanding on your mentality. You want to succeed and you can get the precision and all the physical stuff right, but the element of mental control and self-control is harder and more diffi cult, she said. The fact shooters can still compete at the elite level until their mid-50s means Sedgman could be competing for many gold medals for a very long time. JULIAN TRANTINO

LAURA ENEVER

SURFING

LAURA Enever, 18, has emerged as Australian surfi ngs hottest rising star.

Up until the age of nine Enever was a dedicated gymnast but gave it up when she fell in love with the waves, a decision which is reaping its rewards. In January, she was crowned world junior champion at her local beach in North Narrabeen, Sydney. The dynamo compiled a two-wave score of 18.33 out of 20 to smash Hawaiian Alessa Cuizon (11.10) in the fi nal of the under-20 event.

Enevers star continued to rise throughout 2010 and in August she proved she could beat the pros when she won the Billabong Azores Islands Womens Pro in Portugal her maiden win on the professional circuit. Her Azores win saw her gain a ranking of No. 2 in the World Qualifying Series rankings and assured her qualifi cation for the elite womens World Tour for 2011. Enever is currently ranked fi fth in the junior womens world rankings and has won the most career prizemoney of any junior surfer with $65,490. JULIAN TRANTINO

YOLANE KUKLA

SWIMMING YOLANE Kukla, 15, is one of the brightest prospects for Australia leading into the London Olympic Games in 2012. She gave up gymnastics at 12 due to a knee injury and burst onto the scene at this years national championships, winning the 50 metres freestyle and 50 butterfl y titles.

It was at those championships that the then 14-year-old became the youngest person to qualify for the national team since Ian Thorpe in 1997. Kukla showed her talent at the Commonwealth Games by winning the 50 freestyle after a series of frustrating swims in which she missed out on a spot in the 100 freestyle fi nal and fi nished out of the medals in both the 50 and 100 butterfl y events. There had been concern about how Kukla would handle the trying Indian conditions but the teenager took it in her stride and showed that she will be among the next generation of female swimmers to make their mark on the world stage and help lift Australia back into the top two swimming nations in the world. STATHI PAXINOS

PERFORMER OF THE YEAR WITH A DISABILITY

RYLEY BATT

WHEELCHAIR RUGBY

IN SEPTEMBER 2010, Batt led Australia to the silver medal at the World Championships in Vancouver and was announced as the tournament MVP. He also led Australia to victory in the Canada Cup in Montreal, the major lead-up event to the World Championships, and was named the MVP in Australias victory at the Four Nations Wheelchair Rugby Championships in Sydney in May. In November last year, Australia confi rmed its World Championships qualifi cation with victory in the Oceania zone championships Batt again led the way. Apart from his duties with the national team, Batt played his third professional season in the US in 2009/10 and led his team, the San Diego Sharp Edge, to victory in every major tournament. Batts team defended its US National Championship and Batt was again voted MVP. He then returned home to lead the NSW Gladiators to their fi fth consecutive National Wheelchair Rugby Championship.

MATT COWDREY

SWIMMING

MATT Cowdrey was the only Australian to break a world record at the Commonwealth Games in the S9 50-metre freestyle. In August Cowdrey competed at the World Swimming Championships, winning four individual gold medals and one silver medal as well as being part of the two Australian relay teams that won gold. His World Championship haul of six gold and one silver improved on his incredible performance at the 2008 Beijing Paralympic Games fi ve gold and three silver. At the World Short Course swimming championships in December (2009) he won a further seven gold medals (six in world record time) and two silver medals.

JUSTIN EVESON

WHEELCHAIR BASKETBALL

JUSTIN Eveson is the face of wheelchair basketball in Australia and the world, captaining Australias Rollers to the gold medal at this years World Wheelchair Basketball Championships. He top-scored with 23 points, nine rebounds and three blocks. The Rollers continued their success taking a bronze at the Paralympic World Cup in the UK in May.

He was part of the successful campaign of European side Galatasaray and then returned home to lead the Perth Wheelcats to their fi fth consecutive Australian National Wheelchair Basketball League crown. He has recently been nominated for a Laureus World Sports Award.

KURT FEARNLEY

WHEELCHAIR ATHLETICS KURT Fearnley ended the 2009 year on a high with his fourth-straight victory in the New York marathon.

Just days after taking out the New York event Fearnley embarked on a gruelling 12-day, 96- kilometre journey through some of Papua New Guineas most rugged terrain on the infamous Kokoda Track. It didnt stop in 2010 where the he began with a record breaking six-straight Oz Day 10-kilometre victory in Sydney. He easily won gold in the 1500 at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi.

JESSICA GALLAGHER

SKIING

JESSICA Gallagher became the fi rst Australian female to win a medal at a Winter Paralympics this year when she won bronze in the womens slalom for vision-impaired athletes. Gallagher had only been skiing at the elite level for less than two years when she was selected to represent Australia in athletics for the 2008 Beijing Paralympic Games. After switching sports, she won her fi rst international medal in 2009 at the New Zealand Winter Games (a Paralympic qualifying event), and then won two World Cup bronze medals at the fi rst two World Cup events of 2010. She has since switched back to athletics and has already qualifi ed for the 2011 IPC World Athletics Championships.

CAMERON RAHLES-RAHBULA

SKIING

CAMERON Rahles-Rahbula has had a sterling 2010.

He won two gold medals and one bronze in the three World Cup events in the lead-up to Vancouver.

At the Vancouver Winter Paralympics, Rahles- Rahbula won two bronze medals in the mens slalom and mens super combined (SuperGSlalom).

In the mens super combined he was nearly four seconds off the leader but delivered an outstanding slalom run the fastest of any competitor by almost two seconds to jump into the bronze-medal position. Rahles- Rahbula also took out the coveted prize of 2010 Australian Paralympian of the Year.