If fans hadn't voted, the winners would have been the same, says FIH CEO

Many across the hockey world questioned if it is a good idea to have fans voting for an award that defines the best athletes and coaches from a technical perspective


Indian men hockey team celebrates after winning bronze at Tokyo Olympics (Source: Hockey India)

The International Hockey Federation (FIH) will create a task force to work on its global awards selection process that caused "anger" and "disappointment" this year but its CEO Thierry Weil has asserted that the winners -- all of them Indians -- wouldn't have been different even without fans' votes. India swept the FIH annual awards last Wednesday, claiming all top honours based on a voting system that was lambasted as a "failure" by men's Olympic champions Belgium, prompting the global body to say that it would try to figure why some associations did not cast their ballot.