I called 37 times and got through twice.

Plenty of people on twitter saying similar too.

Well done Kev and very well done the RL community for putting aside club bias. This was a remarkable result for our sport which was up against the establishment's favorite sports.

The BBC showed their bias giving Murray the advantage of the last slot on the show in addition to the best front row seats and plenty of exposure with repeated camera shots. The real surprise was that the BBC did not find an award to give to Andy's mum!

One of the establishment's favourite sports, I'd agree. Unfortunately for Kev, Murray's ancestry almost certainly ensured a large anti-(English) establishment vote from north of the border too. Had Adam Peaty or any other of the lower-polling candidates been a Scot too then Kev would almost certainly have dropped down the list.

Speaking of nationality voting, it was a joke that they gave the Northern Ireland coach the Coach of the year award just because the show was held in Belfast. Had in been in Cardiff I guess Chris Coleman would've won it.

The lifetime achievement award to a lad from Antrim, and the Unsung Hero award to someone from Belfast.

Not that I'm alleging any kind of Northern Irish bias in the award giving, you understand.

As a Saints fan, I just want to say Well Done Kevin.

And well done Rugby League fans for supporting and voting for him.

To be fair to McCoy that is a worthy winner even if it wouldn't have happened if held in another city. Didnt Chris Hoy win it last year? Just need to hold it at the Leeds Arena again and give it to Sinfield or Peacock

The Northern Ireland coach though. Whilst they haven't qualified for a major in ages it was hardly the toughest group and 40% of their qualifiers took place in 2014 for goodness sakes.

An incredible achievement ....amazing to think that in any of the previous ceremonies the amount of votes would (many many times) have given him podium position.

A year Kevin (and the rest of us) will never forget: it couldn't have happened to a greater bloke. A fine way to bow out for a true ambassador for the sport.... Imagine if Tyson Fury had been the RL contender

The Leeds club should highlight and thank the whole RL community for the wonderful response to the plea for all RL supporters to put aside their tribal instincts and join the effort in voting.

Great to also admit a tear for Lizzie Jones' peformance

Well done KS from a Giants Fan, Not the best player I have seen in Leeds colours in 50 years of watching but a credit to Leeds and the game, Shame he didn't' come 1st

I was exactly the same. Tried phoning about 8 times and each one didn't get through. Pretty sure if I was phoning for Murray each one would have been recorded.

Oh well, before it was announced I was saying top 3 would be an amazing achievement and I stand by that. Not just for our club but for the whole sport. He wouldn't have done it if only Leeds fans voted for him, so thanks to the family. I would certainly have voted if it was a different RL player.

The icing would have been Brian Mc getting coach of the year. But I think the Leeds Rhinos have certainly made their mark

In line with his odds with the bookies I was hoping/expecting he'd manage to get 3rd spot ahead of Fury (whose odds had lowered nearer to Sinfield's in the last day or two).

But when Ennis-Hill was announced in 3rd their was about 20 seconds when I thought "bloody hell, maybe just maybe", It was as nervous as a Grand Final.

1st would've been amazing but just glad he made the top 3 and did so with such a massive total of votes. On the red button afterwards Steve Bunce made a great comment saying every year the smaller sports in terms of media coverage always say they're going to vote heavy and get their guy into the the top 3 but never really get close, however RL fans backed up their claim big time and praised them for it.....a comment made better by the obvious frustration in John Inverdale's voice that RL was getting such praise.

Well done to Sir Kevin from a Wigan fan.....

Anybody who used their own club loyalty as an excuse to not vote for him, is a total kno$head.... Sorry mods..

Seemed far fewer than I'd expected. Full credit to you and all the others who set rivalry aside. I'll be ashamed if Leeds fans don't reciprocate should there be another nominee from another club somewhere down the line.

First time I've watched the thing in years. I don't know why but I lways think of Eton Rifles by The Jam, "what chance have you got against a tie and a crest".

It was a really good line up though, several world champions (and not at f******g snooker either). Peaty is multiple world champ and record holder, Mo Farah is the greatest distance runner - probably of all time, Jess Ennis is one of the all time great atheletes, and we had a double tour winner up there. Thought Tyson Fury managed to talk unedited for 3 minutes without making a fool of himself.
There have been years when any one of them could have walked it - christ in the 70's they gave it to princess Anne and in the 80's Steve Davis won it (in an Olympic Year!) and Greg Rusedski won it in 1997 on the back of losing in the US Open final ( a year so diabolically bad that Tm Henman was runner up on the back of achieveing absolutely nothing that year).

Kev has been the image RL needed, he was starting is career just as the game was transitioning to full time professional and he was playing senior rugby when the game began to actually behave like it was full time professional - it took a few years for the message to get through that being a full time pro didn't mean that you had more time recover from your hangover. The only thing I would disagree with him about is that he underestimates just how skillful a player he has been. He had the lot for me, we dismiss things like concentration, fitness, goal kicking, tackling technique, just being able to catch (many can't and it shows) as not being skills, but take them away from a player and you have a bit of pace and a long pass. Pretty useless on their own. We also forget some of the amazing things he has done with the ball in hand because he played so many games. But what he has had through his entire career is superb "game sense". It's the hardest thing to coach and the most important thing in any team sport.
Sometimes you work hard, you have the right attitude on and off the field, you give as much as you can to the people around you and you get rewarded (not always). Congrats to the greatest Leeds player of them all.

And, I don't begrudge Murray the win. Yes, the "whatever" cup is the equivalent of the Johnstone's Paint Trophy, yes, they put him on last, yes they had him sat in the front row and continually cut to him though the entire show so you didn't forget who you were supposed to be voting for but the SPOTY always had the "captures the public imagination" tagline (although how Steve Davis managed to do that is a total mystery to me) which basically means the sport the BBC shows - and they showed all the Davis Cup and people got into it. Murray is a good guy, he works impossibly hard and is a credit to his sport - which is rediculously competitive at all ages and very, very hard to succeed in.

I might actually watch it next year - just as long as they don't give it to that arrogant, selfish p**k Lewis Hamilton. Lewis, it's the car mate

A song partly inspired by a brawl with some of the touring Kangaroos in the Queens Hotel where The Jam were also staying. They came out of it naturally the worst.