Ukraine’s Oleksii Sereda has been named best men’s diver in the 2025 European Aquatics Athlete of the Year Awards after a season in which he earned his first individual world medal.

The 19-year-old took silver in a dramatic 10m platform contest in Singapore that was won with a final flourish by Australia’s Cassiel Rousseau.

Sereda, who secured a 33.23% share of the total vote, thus added to the 10m mixed synchro and 10m synchro silvers he had earned at the respective 2022 and 2023 World Championships.

Two months earlier at the European Aquatics Diving Championships in Antalya Sereda had won three golds to help Ukraine top the medals table with a total of seven medals.

The victories came in the mixed team event, the 10m synchro – in partnership with 15-year-old Mark Hrytsenko – and, for a third time, the 10m platform event which he had previously won as a 14-year-old at the home Championships in Kyiv 2019 and at the 2022 Championships in Rome.

Sereda’s season had begun in promising fashion when he won two medals at the World Aquatics Diving World Cup – Super Final.

The contest for second place was very close, with Poland’s 33-year-old Andrzej Rzeszutek claiming it thanks to a 25.05%  share of the vote, with another super-talented 19-year-old, Italy’s Matteo Santoro, attracting 24.71% of the combined public/national federations poll.

Andrzej Rzeszutek, whose 3m springboard win on he last day of the European Aquatics Diving Championships delighted his Polish team-mates, finished second in the voting. Credit: David Damnjanovic/European Aquatics

Rzeszutek used all his experience to secure Poland’s first medal of the European Aquatics Diving Championships in the last event – and to make it golden.

The man who claimed Poland’s first European diving title in 2024, when he won the 1m springboard event in Belgrade, remained consistent under pressure, taking advantage of a late lapse by Germany’s 2025 1m champion Moritz Wesemann to take over and maintain the lead in the 3m springboard.

Santoro ended the season standing atop the podium at the World Aquatics Championships in after he and his 22-year-old partner Chiari Pellacani – named yesterday as the best female diver in the EA Awards – secured an emotional victory in the mixed 3m synchro.

It was Italy’s first world diving gold since 2015.

The Italian pair had been frustrated in their attempt to win a third European mixed 3m synchro title when Germany’s Luis Avila and Lena Hentschel overtook them with their last dive, taking gold by 0.03.

Santoro also won European bronze in the mixed team event.

Wesemann secured a 9.54% vote share after earning European 1m springboard gold in superb style in Antalya – two years after he had won European 3m ggold in Rzeszow.

During the 3m springboard final the 23-year-old went for broke in pursuit of a double but dropped off the lead after mistiming a late effort, eventually taking bronze.

He added a second gold in the 3m synchro with Timo Barthel.

Earlier in the season Wesemann had claimed bronze medals in the 3m synchro and 3m springboard at the World Aquatics Diving World Cup – Super Final in Beijing’s Water Cube.

He finished his season by taking sixth place in the 1m and 3m springboard events at the World Aquatics Championships in Singapore.

Great Britain’s Jordan Houlden – who secured a vote share of 7.40% – finished as top European in the 1m and 3m springboard events at the World Aquatics Championships in Singapore, missing the podium by one place in both finals.

The 27-year-old from Sheffield – who finished fifth in the Paris 2024 3m springboard event = had the bittersweet achievement of producing one of the highest non-medal-winning totals recorded in the 3m event.

He scored 492.10 in finishing behind Mexico’s Olvera Ibarra and  China’s Yuan Cao and Zongyuan Wang.

Houlden had qualified second for the 1m springboard final, where he missed out on a medal by just 0.35 as he finished on 405.15 behind China’s bronze medallist Yan Siyu.

Houlden’s season began in promising style in April when he was the surprise winner of the 3m springboard title at the second leg of the World Aquatics Diving World Cup in Windsor, Canada.

A total of 470.85 earned him his first global gold.

Mike Rowbottom for European Aquatics