The FA Community Awards presented by McDonald’s
Devon County FA Awards 2009/2010
Devon County FA staged their annual Charter Standard Community Awards ceremony at Exeter City FC on Wednesday 21st July 2010.
This evening allows the Devon County FA to recognise the achievements of the football workforce in Devon. The awards ceremony provides recognition to clubs and individuals who are striving to improve standards and partcipation of grassroots football.
The evening was excellently hosted by former West Country T.V. sports presenter Jeff Welch, Jeff’s remit for the evening in a Oscar’s style was to present the nominations for each of the 11 categories, and provide the evidence of why those shortlisted had been recognised for their acheivements.
The nominations, winners and categories were as follows;
Coach of the Year
Nominations: Mark Wickett and Mike Needs.
Winner : Mike Needs
Mike has been instrumental in the development of his club which has grown from 2 to 12 teams, providing football for over 230 youngsters.
Young Volunteer of the year
Nominations: Katie Middleton, Michael Humphreys and Mark Senior
Winner : Katie Middleton
Katie is a full time Physio at Derriford Hospital, Girls Centre Of Excellence coach and played for Bristol Academy Ladies in the Women’s Premier Division last season, despite these commitments, Katie continues to remain loyal and commits large amount of voluntary time to one of Devon’s largest Charter Standard Community Clubs in Activate Youth.
Volunteer of the year
Nominations: Ian Summerscales, Paul A’Lee, Kevin Smith and Sarah Short
Winner : Paul A’Lee
Paul is the club treasurer, Charter Standard administrator as well as manager and coach, he trains various Twyford teams a total of 4 nights of the week and he is also the fixture secretary for the Juventus Youth League.
Charter Standard Club of the year
Nominations: Keyham Kolts FC and Central Youth FC
Winner : Keyham Kolts FC
Keyham offer Charter Standard football to children in a deprived area of Plymouth and have a hard working committee dedicated to ensuring football is accessible to all within the community. Work with Devon FA resulted in a successful Grow the Game application which will be used to develop girls football within the club.
Charter Standard Development Club of the year
Nominations: Twyford Spartans Youth FC and Morley Rangers Youth FC
Winner : Twyford Spartans Youth FC
The RESPECT Programme is something the club looks to promote throughout club members, seeing it as a vital aspect of ensuring a friendly atmosphere for all within the club. Formed 36 years ago, the Tiverton based club now has 15 teams ranging from Under 8 to Under 16 including female teams and the club is keen to continue growing in size.
Charter Standard Community Club of the year
Nominations: Bideford Blues & Appledore Junior FC and Stoke Gabriel FC
Winner : Bideford Blues & Appledore Junior FC
A Football Foundation supported project has recently seen the club’s facilities dramatically improved including the opening of the fantastic new 3G all weather pitch at their Sandymere base. Bideford have established many partnerships in recent years such as links with Torridge District Council to provide summer coaching camps and the Uniformed Services to provide the ‘Soccersafe’ programme
Services to refereeing
Nominations: Duncan Underhill, Dudley Frood and John Hockin
Winner : John Hockin
Chairman of Devon County FA Referees committee, Chairman of South Referees Association branch, carries out South area examinations for new referees and still active over past 12 months at 64 years old.
Outstanding Contribution to the Respect programme
Winner : Allen Lewis
Single handily tackled the Respect Programme at Tavistock, regularly faced reluctance to adopt programme within the club but has still continued to tackle the abusive behaviour and Finalist for the Bobby Moore National Respect award.
Services to Devon County FA
Winner : Jim Pearcy
Jim has managed to attend every single Representative side fixture over the past 12 months including overseas fixtures, he attends every County Cup Final and produced a match report for every Final played, A great ambassador for the Association as he makes sure that all of the other County FA’s know the results of games played.
Outstanding contribution to Community Football
Nominations: Lee Hayward and Wendy Humphries
Winner : Wendy Humphries
Wendy helped the Devon Girls League became Devon’s first Charter Standard League. Since the implementation of the Development Plan, the league has continued to go from strength to strength, has continued to run the girls section at Twyford Spartans as well as her role as league secretary. Twyford has seen a new under 11 team, under 13 team in the Devon Girls league and an under 15 team in the North Devon Girls League.
The Steve Betts Memorial Trophy
Winner : Marcus Scott
Marcus has been involved with one club for over 35 years as a player, manager, chairman and secretary. Worked tirelessly over 4 years to raise funds to support the re-build of the club’s changing room facilities, which was completed earlier this year in a project worth around £250,000.