Jake Diekman



Last Christmas Diekman, who had battled with ulcerative colitis since childhood but not let it kill his dreams of becoming a professional baseball player, had an alarming flare-up. Surgery was scheduled for 25 January, four days after his 30th birthday, after which there was another in April, and a third in June. His colon was removed and rebuilt, leaving him “really freaking sore” and eventually with what is known as a J-pouch, fashioned out of his small intestine, replacing it altogether. In February he pledged to make a quick return to baseball, to his doctors’ displeasure. “I’m going to push very hard,” he said. “A lot of people are like, ‘No you’re not’, and I was like, ‘I’m pitching the second half of the year.’” He did just that, returning to action in August and to the Texas Rangers team in September. He went on to make 11 appearances, finishing with an ERA (earned run average) of 2.53 (which, for those who have no idea what an ERA is, is good).

But more important than the bravery he showed during his recovery and the determination that fuelled his return was his insistence on making every step of it public, making regular video updates for a Dallas newspaper and conducting countless interviews. His aim was to raise awareness and to support sufferers of Irritable Bowel Disease, and also to raise funds through his Gut it Out foundation, also launched this year. “If others see me going through it maybe they’re not so scared,” he said. “It’s scary, don’t get me wrong, but you just have to trust the process and have a good attitude.” He hopes, with his openness, to normalise a condition that is often seen as being too awkward to discuss. “It doesn’t have to be embarrassing, and it’s not just all about going to the bathroom a lot,” he says. “There doesn’t need to be a stigma behind having a bag, or having these diseases, because at the end of the day, we are all human.” SB

Alfie Hewett



Wheelchair tennis often flies under the radar at grand slams, but it is a wonderfully entertaining sport at its best. It takes tremendous levels of dedication and skill to rise to the top and Alfie Hewett had to demonstrate both qualities in ample quantities when he faced Argentina’s Gustavo Fernández in the French Open final last June. Hewett was 19 at the time and, though he was a double silver medallist at the 2016 Paralympic Games, his hopes of winning his first singles title at a major looked over when he found himself on the wrong end of a bagel in the first set. The likeable Norwich City fan was a bag of nerves, but gathered his thoughts during the changeover, elected to keep fighting and mounted a stirring comeback to stun his opponent and triumph 0-6, 7-6 (11-9) 6-2, becoming the first British winner of the men’s wheelchair singles title at Roland Garros. A teenager had made history on the Parisian clay and Hewett wasn’t done there, teaming up with Gordon Reid to beat the tough French pair of Stephane Houdet and Nicolas Peifer to the Wimbledon doubles title for the second successive year. He is one of the finest young athletes around. JS

Alfie Hewett won the French Open singles and Wimbledon doubles in a tremendous 2017. Photograph: Ben Hoskins/(Credit too long, see caption)

The squash power couple

Neither Nour El Tayeb nor Ali Farag had won a top-tier World Series event in squash before the US Open in October. The Egyptian pair’s performances had been improving, but they had yet to scratch that itch before travelling to Philadelphia. It all came together on one memorable afternoon, though. On a day of high emotion, Farag watched El Tayeb win the women’s final and El Tayeb watched Farag win the men’s final, husband and wife supporting each other in their pursuit of glory. And to think some people say that marriage doesn’t work. JS

Sam Kasiano and friends

In January Sam Kasiano, the rugby league prop affectionately known as Dogzilla and famous, according to one Australian website, “for setting records in the kebab shop, where he has previously eaten seven in one sitting”, travelled to Fiji with a few teammates for his wedding. The kebab business isn’t really relevant, but it was hard to leave out. It was a dramatic time to be in Fiji, what with an earthquake on the morning of the big day that measured 7.2 on the Richter scale and, once that passed, a tsunami warning forced them to flee to higher ground. “We were running looking for our kids, for our wives,” said Mario Tartak, Kasiano’s manager. “Everyone was pretty distressed. You look at your kids and you look at your wife and everybody was terrified.”

When they looked down from the hilltop they saw someone stuck at the bottom, struggling with his disabled father. “We were swimming and suddenly we all had to race up the safe spot of the hill,” said Sean Brown, the struggling son. “We got out of this buggy and I was struggling to get my dad out. There were heaps of blokes sitting around not giving a damn. All of a sudden you see [Greg] Eastwood [another prop], and [Frank] Pritchard [Kasiano’s best man and Samoa team-mate] pick my old man up and carry him on their shoulders up the hill. When we got to the top Kasiano was giving water to my dad and taking care of him. They ran down from the top of the hill and away from their families to help.” The big wave never materialised and the wedding went ahead, but Kasiano clearly still had an appetite for extreme weather-related activities: in July he moved to Melbourne Storm. SB

Victoria Azarenka

Luck has rarely been on Victoria Azarenka’s side in recent years. Few players on the WTA Tour can match her natural ability and one of the most heartening moments of the tennis season was seeing the former Australian Open champion return to the grind in time for Wimbledon. After recovering from a series of serious injuries, she had returned after giving birth to her first child, and reaching the fourth round at SW19 was a promising sign for the Belarusian. Yet events conspired against her again. A custody battle over her son Leo left her unable to leave California, ruling her out of both the US Open and Belarus’s first Fed Cup final. “No parent should have to decide between their child or their career,” the 28-year-old wrote in an open letter on social media. It was tough for Azarenka to take, but she maintained her dignity throughout and the good news is that there is a happy twist in the form of her wildcard at next month’s Australian Open. JS

Victoria Azarenka made a run to the fourth round at Wimbledon before off-court events stalled her comeback. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian

Simone Zaza

There are certainly sportsmen who have come back from greater adversity than Zaza, but the Italian’s resurrection is nevertheless remarkable. In 2016 he started 10 club games, spent 13 on the bench, and scored three goals. There were also nine international caps, the most infamous of which was the Euro 2016 quarter-final against Germany, in which he came on with penalties looming, and then spanked his over the bar after a comedy high-stepping run-up. “It really traumatised me,” he said in January. “After the Euros I felt really terrible. Over the summer I lost a lot of weight. The things that hurt me the most were the [YouTube] videos, the Zaza Dance.” His decision to move to West Ham that summer was another poor one. “Very quickly I found that many things upset me: the environment, the culture, the training, the food. I’m not saying I’m a victim, I know very well that I earn a lot of money playing football. I’m just trying to explain the causes of this failure.” In January he moved to Valencia, and something changed. His first goal for the club felt, he said, “like being reborn”; he has gone on to score 16 in the league over the year, despite playing with a persistent knee injury. SB