Football
Midfielder scoops hat-trick of awards

Buy photos » Club President Dr. Pete Kilvert presents Robbie Banks with one of his three awards. Picture by Martin Pulley.

MIDFIELDER Robbie Banks was the big winner at Rugby Town’s annual presentation evening on Friday, scooping three of the six main first team player awards.

Banks joined Valley from Atherstone last September and went on to put in a series of consistent performances in his first season at Butlin Road.

He came top in both the supporters’ and the Vice Presidents’ vote, as well as taking the Media Star Man award - given to the player with the most man of the match nominations across the season.

Striker Tyrone Fagan got the nod from Dave Stringer to scoop the Manager’s Player of the Year trophy, with Luke Keen and Gary Moran winning the Golden Boot and the Bob Giles Shield for topping the goalscoring and starting appearance charts respectively.

Bob’s family presented the appearance award to Gary in memory of the long-standing supporter who passed away in September 2010, with another friend of the club who sadly died this season - Carl Barnes - also honoured on the evening with the presentation of a Memorial Shield to the club by Carl’s family.

This new prize was accepted on behalf of the club by defender Moran and supporter Martin Defferd, and will be awarded for the first time at the end of next season to recognise an as yet undefined achievement.

The Call-A-Car award for commitment went to Lynval da Costa and the Clubman of the Year was Jim Dand.

The club’s youth team player of the year awards were also presented at the event in the VS Bar - with Ryan Evans being the choice of manager Roy Miller, Nick Vangelidis winning the award from his fellow players and Aaron Hinds topping the fans’ poll.

Club Director Mike Yeats thanked everyone for their contribution and support during a season which saw Town narrowly miss out on a place in the play-offs for the second year in a row, and looked forward to the 2012-13 campaign which he hoped would see the club regain their status at Step Three of the non-league football pyramid.

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