The five players are South Africa's Francois Hougaard and Cornal Hendricks, Welshman Jamie Roberts, Canada's Magali Harvey and England's Jonny May.

The quintet of tries were selected by the IRPA Try of Year panel made up of former players in Samoa's Seilala Mapusua, New Zealand's Jeff Wilson, Ireland's Alan Quinlan and Scotland's Dan Parks.

Roberts was the man on the end of a flowing team try, involving Liam Williams and Taulupe Faletau, which took Wales from deep in their own half to the line in their RBS Six Nations win over Scotland at the Millennium Stadium in March.

Hendricks marked his Springbok debut with a try, after Willie le Roux had drawn defenders to him before spreading the ball wide to the right, in the first of two Tests against Wales in June.

Scrum-half Hougaard dived under the posts to finish off a move that had begun deep in South Africa's half and involved all of the backline as the Springboks ended a losing run against New Zealand with a 27-25 win in the Rugby Championship in October. 

Harvey scored a try that helped put Canada into a first Women's Rugby World Cup final in August.

Within metres of their own line, Canada pushed France off a scrum and quickly spread the ball wide to the 2014 International Rugby Board (IRB) Women's Player of the Year, who raced to halfway and then stepped the French cover defence inside out before racing clear.

The most recent of the shortlist was May's who received the ball on halfway and ran around Conrad Smith and Israel Dagg to score his first Test try and give England the perfect start against world champions New Zealand at Twickenham earlier this month.

Jonny May's try for England against New Zealand in November is on the shortlist
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In support of the initial nomination process, fans now have the chance to have their say on the shortlist via social media.

The results of the public vote will be considered by the panel when finalising the winner.

"These players have all given enormous enjoyment to fans around the world with their skill," said World Rugby chairman Bernard Lapasset.

"These tries are testament to rugby's character-building values of teamwork and enjoyment and I am looking forward to seeing the result of the fan voting."

Previous winners of the award include New Zealand's Beauden Barrett, South Africa's Bryan Habana and Australia's Radike Samo.

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