I laughed when I saw Giggs was on the list. I'll vote soon but don't think Button should win.

Personally think it should be a toss-up between Cav and Strauss. What Cav acheived in the Tour is greater than simply winning a World Championship in cycling terms and when you throw in his win in the Milan-San Remo classic it has genuinely been a remarkable year. No sprinter has acheived as much in the time I've been following road racing.

Sttrass isn't necessarily an obvious pick, but when it comes to both character and acheivement its been a pretty remarkable year. He's gone from being dropped from the side to coming back and making runs under pressure, taking on the captaincy under the most difficult conditions and still improving his individual performance. He's then managed to lead a team to an Ashes win (claiming player of the series in the process - put these two together and I think they're easily the equivalent of a WC). The key thing is that he is a captain who has led his team to over-acheive. Vaughan, Smith, Ponting etc. have all been captains of great teams. A great team is relatvely easy to captain. England are certainly not in that bracket at the moment yet Strauss manages to get them playing well most of the time. He's also done it with dignity and a decent ruthless streak. Anyone able to behave with dignity in South Africa gets my respect!

Ennis has done brilliantly, but I don't see her acheivement being any greater than that of Idowu and I don't think either of them warrant the prize this year. Don't see why Daley warrants a nomination more than the other World Champs from the Swiimming WCs. On top of that I don't think his personality has been great - why go to the national papers to tell them that you're changin school because you were bullied? Realise it was his dad that did this but I find the way they've engineered his press coverage unsavoury. He clearly has talent though and does deserve respect for that.

Button? Ultimately I have respect for him but pretty much any acheivement in F1 needs to be set in the context of having a better/worse car than other people so that rules him out. On that basis, I agree that McCoy hasn't been included but think he would have been more worthy than Button. David Haye may win it when he beats a Klitchsko. I'll file Tweddle under the same bracket as the athletes and rule out Giggs on the basis that I think it would represent more of a lifetime acheivement award (something he richly deserves).

Thats's my run-down anyway.

Andy Murray why's he on the shortlist?
The winner of BBC spoty 2009 is a Tennis player who failed to reach his promise and bottled it on several occasions when it mattered most. Andy Murray... I think not.

Cavendish/Haye all the way. But neither will win it.

He's Scottish.

My vote would in all honesty go to Harry Redknapp. i'm counted JP's, Andy B's and Eake's vote and added them to the list below:

Harry Redknapp - 4
Jenson Button - 0
Mark Cavendish - 0
Thomas Daley - 0
Jessica Ennis - 2
Ryan Giggs - 0
David Haye - 0
Philips Idowu - 0
Andrew Murray - 0
Andrew Strauss - 0
Beth Tweddle - 0

He warrants nothing until he wins a major.

I'll add a vote for Harry here too.

Harry Redknapp - 5
Jessica Ennis - 2
Rest of the field - 0

What's a communter? Some sort of ugly Russian? (Think about it....)

Nearly there, its a cross between an ugly person and someone trying to get to work...gotta have you finger on the pulse these days, down and hip and all that, (kids and their words *shakes fist*)

I would never call a knight of the realm a Communist

I've read it all now, Peregrine the voice of reason and not even one gay inuendo there either. Fatherhood really has brought a new maturity to his life. Shame.