On Saturday Tennis Wales held our annual awards ceremony recognising the sport’s big hitters – the people and organisations that have contributed most to the sport during the past year.
The winners include players, volunteers, coaches and clubs/centres.
The ceremony at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama in Cardiff was hosted by TV presenter and tennis enthusiast, Arfon Haines Davies and guests included Simon Jones, Head of Performance Support at the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA), Chris Jenkins, Chief Executive of Commonwealth Games Wales and Geraint Richards, Head of Disability Player Performance at the Tennis Foundation.
“The awards recognise our most talented and dedicated people – on and off the court, especially those who make it possible for thousands to enjoy tennis in Wales every week,” said our chief executive Peter Drew.
“It has been a very successful year for Welsh tennis – winning the Home Nations title in Scotland, and bringing home three medals from the Commonwealth Youth Games in Samoa.
“There were individual successes for some of our top young players, including Josh Milton from Cardiff and Evan Hoyt from Llanelli, and in disability tennis from Shain Lewis of Builth Wells and Debbie Brazier from Newport. The Wales wheelchair tennis team lost by one point in the national finals, and Wales picked up a bronze medal for Ben Jones at the British Schools Wheelchair Games.
“The 2015 Sport Wales School Sport Survey showed that we now have 5,000 more children at school playing tennis, and community tennis has developed in areas that had previously struggled to make tennis accessible and available to the public.
“At the end of 2015 we saw the opening of a brand new indoor community tennis centre in Cardiff which will now hopefully become a beacon for community tennis.”
The event was well attended and a great success. Following a short quiz the guests raised £266.36 for Sport Relief 2016. Prior to the event the Awards shortlisting panel had the extremely hard job of narrowing down all the nominees to just 3 shortlisted candidates and then deciding on the overall winner for each category. The standard of nominations was extremely high, however as with all Awards, there could only be 1 winner!!
The winners were:
Young Volunteer (sponsored by Inspire2Coach) – Luke Difranco (Newport)
Volunteer – Alun Bowditch (Aberdare Tennis Club)
Personal Contribution Award – Carys Howard-Rees (Beacons Tennis Academy)
Education – Gower College Sports Department
Disability Programme Award – Newtown Tennis Club / Martin Ellacott
Community Venue – De La Beche Park (Sketty) / Ann Peregrine Davies
Special Recognition Award – Wales team for Commonwealth Youth Games
Coach of the Year – Chris Lewis (Cardiff Met XL Academy)
Player of the Year – Matthew Story (Cardiff)
Club Team – Cardiff LTC Men’s Doubles 1st Team
Team of the Year – South Wales Ladies over-35s
Club or Centre – Windsor LTC, Penarth
Eight of the category winners will go through to the nominations process at the inaugural British Tennis Awards, to be presented in London in June.
To view photos of the winners click on the names above.
Extra pictures:
The guests
Ellinore and Rebekah O'Loughlin - being interviewed for Commonwealth Youth Games
Chris Jenkins - being interviewed for Commonwealth Youth Games
Arfon Haines-Davies
All winners