Voting is over and handball fans and experts from across the globe have elected the best players in 2014. Voting took place between 13 and 20 February 2015 and more than 55,000 fans from all over the globe had a chance to choose the players they believe to be the best of the past year.

With 33.7 % of the votes, French superstar Nikola Karabatic is the clear winner of the award leaving the Danish ace Mikkel Hansen with 21 % of the votes in second place and his national team colleague and MVP from the World Championship in Qatar, Thierry Omeyer, in third place with 19.5 % of the votes.

It is the second time Nikola Karabatic receives this award after previously winning it in 2007 when he made his first big impact on the world of handball and sports in general. Karabatic led his national team to the European Championship title in January 2014, beating host Denmark in the final of the EURO, and was instrumental to his club’s journey to the EHF Champions League Final Four in Cologne. Karabatic currently plays his club handball in Spanish giants FC Barcelona.

Karabatic began his professional career in French top side Montpellier HB. With Montpellier he became French Champion in 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005 and also won the Champions League in 2003. He then moved to German club THW Kiel, becoming German Champion in 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2009, and winning the EHF Champions League in 2007. In the summer of 2009 he left Germany and came back to Montpellier HB, winning three other French Championship titles in 2010, 2011 and 2012. After a short stay in Pays d'Aix Université Club Handball (Aix-en-Provence) between February and June 2013, he arrived at his current club FC Barceleona.

The winner in the women’s category Eduarda Amorim received 35.2 % of the votes leaving Cristina Neagu from Romania in second place with 25.8 % of the votes and Heide Løke in third place with 16.8 %. Amorim is the second Brazilian to be crowned World Handball Player of the Year in three years, after Alexandra do Nascimento won this award in 2012. Amorim, a World Champion from Serbia in 2013, plays for Hungarian outfit Györi Audi ETO KC. She was instrumental in her side lifting the EHF Champions League trophy last year for the second time in a row.

Amorim started to play handball at the age of 11 in the Colégio Barão do Rio Branco. She moved to Metodista/São Bernardo in 2002, with whom she won the second place in the Brazilian League. She moved to Europe in February 2006, joining her sister in the Macedonian capital team Kometal Skopje. She spent three and a half seasons with Kometal, winning the Macedonian Championship three times in the process. After leaving Skopje, Amorim found her new home in Hungary, signing with Győri Audi ETO KC on 23 February 2009. She won the Champions League in 2013 and 2014. Additionally, in an online fans' poll launched by the European Handball Federation she was chosen the best left back of the competition in 2014. With the Brazilian national team, the left back won the gold medal at the 2007 and 2011 Pan American Games. She also participated in the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, where the Brazilian team placed ninth, and in the 2012 Olympic Games in London, where they were unluckily eliminated in the quarter-finals by later winner Norway. In 2013 she won the World Championship in Serbia and was elected Most Valuable Player of the competition.

The IHF congratulates the two players and will announce the place and date of the awarding ceremony at the soonest. In addition the IHF thanks the handball media and fans for investing their time to vote for the 2014 World Handball Players of the Year.