If Manchester City's Shaun Goater continues his dazzling heroics, he could well be in the running for next year's local sporting awards.

Come 2004, the ranks of Bermuda's professional sportspersons will no longer be ineligible from consideration for the annual honours.

As the Island gets ready to salute the best performers of 2002 tonight at Hamilton Princess, Sports Minister Randy Horton has declared this is the last occasion on which some of Bermuda's best athletes are sidelined from vying for such recognition because of their pro status.

This annoucement means that footballers like Goater, David Bascome, Kyle Lightbourne and John Barry Nusum as well as golfer Michael Sims and basketballers David Patrick and Sullivan Phillips can in the future be candidates for the awards.

"That's something we are looking at and it will change as of next year. We have recognised that we need to have it changed and next year we'll see a difference. We have a group that's looking at it now," Horton told The Royal Gazette.

Noting that in some instances there was little difference between professional and amateur status, Horton acknowledged the role which top stars like Goater are playing and the limelight they bring to their birthplace.

"These people are doing Bermuda proud and they deserve to be honoured too and particularly by their own people," said the Minister.