Palmer’s first piece nominated was titled "Manipulating time and space - why more people should know about Kaori Icho", an article about Japan’s four-time Olympic champion.

His second article was "Taking a tumble down a Liechtenstein rabbit hole" about Palmer’s fascination with Liechtenstein football, something sparked by playing the computer game Football Manager 2020.

Palmer has worked for insidethegames since 2015 in a number of roles, including as desk editor, Middle East editor and, currently, as editorial manager for client accounts, special projects and magazines.

He was part of insidethegames’ six-strong team that covered the re-arranged Olympic Games in Tokyo last year.

"Dan is one of those journalists who is happy to turn his attention to anything and always does it well," insidethegames editor Duncan Mackay said.

"His blogs always look at some of the more offbeat aspects of world sport and I am delighted the quality of his writing has been recognised by AIPS."

Also included on the longlist is Liam Morgan, who recently left his role as chief senior reporter at insidethegames after seven years with the world's leading independent Olympic news website.  

He is nominated for "Threats, a judging cabal and toothpaste tubes - how AIBA corrupted Olympic boxing", a look at the report published by Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren that uncovered the level of manipulation of results at Rio 2016.

In 2015, then senior reporter Nick Butler finished third in the Journalistic Weblog category at the AIPS awards.