Star striker Gagan Ajit Singh, sidelined since the Athens Olympics in August, and Indian captain Dilip Tirkey have been nominated for the International Hockey Federation's Best Player of the Year award.

Gagan and Dilip will face tough competition from eight other top performers from various countries in the race for the award to be announced on Thursday.

India's Adrian D'Souza has got a nomination in the Most Promising Player category following his fabulous show under the bar since making is debut.

Gagan, who had an average outing in the Olympics, missed the eight-match Test series against Pakistan due to injury and was not considered for selection for the two-Test series against Spain in Chandigarh and the ongoing Champions Trophy.

The other nominees are world's leading goal scorer Sohail Abbas, Muhammed Nadeem (both from Pakistan), Ronald Brouwer, Jeroen Delmee (both from Holland), Jamie Dwyer, Bevan George (both from Australia), Craig Jackson of South Africa and Xavier Rigas of Spain.

The nominees in the Most Promising player category include Salman Akbar (Pakistan), Floris Evers (Holland), Santiago Freixa, Eddie Tubau (both Spain), Rob Hammond, Mark Knowles (both Australia), Matias Peredes (Argentina), Matthias Witthaus and Christopher Zeller (both Germany).

Incidentally, both Dilip and Gagan had won nominations for the best player and the most promising player awards respectively last year. Teun de Nooijer of Holland won the best player award while Grant Schubert of Australia had bagged the Most Promising Player award then.