Matt Maher: Local heroes shone bright in a golden year for sport

Granted, you might not share the sentiment if your sole focus fell on professional football.

But the Commonwealth Games threw the spotlight on the region like never before and a number of our athletes shone under its gaze.

Here then are the highlights – along with a few lowlights thrown in for balance – from the past 12 months.

Best performance: If suffering a ruptured appendix five weeks before a Commonwealth Games of which he was the poster boy didn’t make things tough enough for Joe Fraser, the England gymnast then fractured a foot just a fortnight out from Birmingham 2022.

But none of it seemed to faze the former Sandwell Academy student, who battled through the pain of several wince-inducing landings to claim three gold medals in front of an expectant home crowd.

Just a few weeks later, at somewhere much closer to full strength, the 23-year-old became the first British male to win all-around European gold, before then helping the British team come back from the dead to claim team bronze at November’s world championships. Quite the year.

Biggest disappointment: Steven Gerrard entered 2022 promising big things at Villa and such was his strength of conviction it was easy to believe he could deliver.

Alas, there proved to be very little substance behind the style. From a high point in March, when his team won three on the spin to briefly move into the top half of the Premier League table, things went quickly downhill.

Gerrard was sacked 11 matches into his first full season in charge with Villa having won only two and scored just seven goals. Unai Emery is the next man tasked with attempting to turn the club from pretenders to contenders.

Best comeback: The prize for most breathtaking turnaround would surely go to Staffordshire’s Adam Peaty, who wrote Birmingham 2022’s most unexpected redemption story when he responded to losing his first race in four years by winning the only event to have eluded him through his career just 48 hours later.

But when it comes to courageous fightbacks, the legendary swimmer is pipped in these awards by Alice Kinsella.

The 21-year-old Park Wrekin gymnast appeared to be cruising to all-around Commonwealth gold before falling off the beam and having no place to hide from the cameras when emotion overtook her.

A couple of days later the rollercoaster continued with another fall on the beam, this time in the apparatus final, followed by a nerveless, brilliant display to win gold on the floor.

Kinsella would go on to win all-around silver at the European Championships and then help the British women’s team to an historic silver at the world championships – narrowly missing out on a further medal herself in the individual competition.

Most deafening moment: The final lap of the women’s 10,000 metres at Birmingham 2022, which culminated in a brilliant victory for Eilish McColgan, is a strong contender here.

But the Alexander Stadium does not have a roof and the truly ear-splitting volume came during the last minute of Delicious Orie’s gold medal bout with India’s Sagat Ahlawat at the NEC.

Born in Moscow of mixed Nigerian and Russian heritage, the Bilston super heavyweight’s incredible journey also makes him a strong candidate for most inspiring story of the year. There is certainly no-one who can touch him in the award for best name.

Quickest fall from grace: Believe it or not, there was one journalist sat not a million miles away from this keyboard who back in January wrote a column arguing why Bruno Lage should be in the running for the imaginary prize of Premier League manager of the season (so far).

At the time, it was fair comment. Wolves had won four out of five matches to sit eighth in the Premier League table, expectations were being exceeded and the prospect of European football was very real.

Lage’s record in the 27 matches after the piece was published and before he was sacked on October 2? Seven wins, five draws, 15 defeats.

Most unheralded achievement: People in boxing circles can get sniffy about the IBO titles and there is no point pretending it is as coveted as the WBC, WBA and IBF crowns.

But when Sam Eggington defeated Przemyslaw Zysk to claim the IBO super welterweight title in June he became the first Black Country boxer since Rob Norton 23 years earlier to hold a version of the world title. It also marked the highest point yet of one of professional boxing’s more unusual careers.

The fact Eggington then lost his first defence having agreed to go and fight in Australia ranked among the year’s biggest disappointments.

Best Houdini Act: It was hardly a stellar summer for either Warwickshire or Worcestershire.

Instead, it looked like being something of a disaster for the Bears, the reigning county champions who went into the final match of the season against Hampshire in the relegation zone, needing a win and help elsewhere to survive.

It looked a long shot when they set their opponents a target of just 139 for victory.

Enter Liam Norwell, who promptly took career best figures of 9-62 to help the Bears win by five runs and maintain Division One status. Quite possibly the best bowling spell in the club's 140-year history.

Most inspiring story: When journalists headed to interview Matt Hudson-Smith minutes after he had claimed a brilliant bronze at the world championships, they could not have guessed the story he was about to deliver.

The Wolverhampton 400 metre runner, the first British one-lap specialist to win a world medal since 1991, opened up on the struggles he had experienced away from the track with debt and injury, explaining how at the lowest point 12 months earlier he had even attempted suicide.

It was stunning, shocking, sobering stuff, yet the good news is Hudson-Smith has emerged from the darkness and is now dreaming of brighter days after the best season of his career, which also saw him break Iwan Thomas’ 25-year-old British record and gold at the European championships.