BBC Women’s Footballer of the Year nominee Temwa Chawinga has recounted how she has faced online trolling about whether she is a biological male.

Chawinga’s older sister and Malawi team-mate Tabitha has also claimed she herself had been forced to strip in public during matches amid suspicions she was not female.

Temwa, 28, was this week nominated for the BBC prize, which will be presented for the first time during its Sports Personality of the Year ceremony.

There has been nothing to suggest the Chawinga sisters have failed to meet sex eligibility rules but that has not prevented doubt being cast by opponents and fans about whether they are female.

In a 2021 interview, Tabitha – currently the Malawi captain – told The Guardian that, while playing for a school team when she was 13, she was forced to undress in front of an opposing team who did not believe she was a girl because of her physical appearance and how well she played.

“I had never been so devastated and I cried at the embarrassment that I had been exposed to,” she said of an incident that made her quit the sport for a year. “I wanted to walk out right away but somehow my team-mates consoled me and I decided to finish the game.”

She said the same thing happened a year later when she took her first step towards a professional career with DD Sunshine.

“We were participating in a Presidential Cup match and for our first game we travelled to Blantyre to play Blantyre Zero,” she said. “It was a very difficult game and while it was being played, I was undressed right in the ground. I lost it right at that moment and we ended up losing the game as well.”

Saying that she was also regularly trolled on social media about her looks, she added: “I don’t want other people to face the same. It makes me think, if they are insulting someone they have just met at the football ground, what would they do if I was born in their family. Could they have killed me?”

Tabitha also spoke out last year after she and her sister were subjected to abuse on Facebook, prompting their manager, Tiana Msolomba, to threaten legal action to protect them from cyberbullying.

Amid attacks that included the pair not “being feminine enough”, Msolomba told Malawian newspaper The Nation: “The trend is sadly on the increase and action needs to be taken.”

Tabitha said: “It’s sad to see your people attack and bully you so much. They literally spare their time to spread hate. But God has more people for us than against us. So, we stay focused. Me and my sister, therefore, have chosen to focus on our God-given purpose, playing football.

“We refuse to pay attention to people or channels that advocate and spread hate about us or other athletes. We believe their hateful actions are a reflection of themselves and not us.”

After Malawi qualified for the first time for the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations, the Chawinga sisters starred as the country reached this summer’s final. They lost 3-0 to Cameroon but finishing as runners-up secured qualification for their maiden World Cup. Temwa also won the Golden Boot after scoring five goals and providing two assists, and Tabitha scored four times.

Temwa plays in the United States’s National Women’s Soccer League for Kansas City Current and helped her club clinch the NWSL Shield last year as the league’s top team in the regular season. She became the first player to be named NWSL player of the year in back-to-back campaigns after winning the Golden Boot for the second straight year.

She has been shortlisted for the BBC prize alongside Alessia Russo, Khadija Shaw, Ewa Pajor and Alexia Putellas. The winner is decided by a worldwide public vote and will be presented at the Spoty ceremony on December 13.

Temwa was not included last week in the Fifpro Women’s World 11, in which Orlando Pride and Zambia striker Barbra Banda was chosen as one of three forwards.