Barry Town Player of the Year Awards 2003-04

all pics by Dwight Fry & TV Africa (Wales)

For keeping Barry Town AFC ticking over at our lowest point, the N&M Construction team manager, Matthew Case, was awarded with a framed photo of N&M Construction representing Barry Town AFC at yr Oval, Caernarfon, September 2003. Each player also received individual snaps of their historic team photo.

N&M Construction also represented Barry Town AFC in the League Cup against Caersws and competed remarkably well against a team that was to ultimately finish in 5th position in the Welsh Premier League, just 4 points short of a place in European competition!

Luke Sherbon picks up the awards for an absent Gavin Allen from Barry Town Supporters Club committee member (and club whistler) Neil White. Gavin won 2 awards; Highest Scorer of the Season, and a special award marking his 100th WPL goal - a benchmark he set while at Barry town this season.

The Manager's 'Player of the Year Award' was giving to goalkeeper Lee Rudall by Assistant Manager Dave Hughes. Lee was Barry 'keeper in one of our toughest ever seasons. Depite there being 91 players on Barry Town's books for the 2003-04 season, Lee has been there for much of it.

When the votes were counted, 2 players came out on top as the Supporter's Players of the Season. Dean Philpott has been virtually ever-present in the Barry defence since February with Colin Addison obviously pleased with Dean's efforts as well as the fans. Luke Sherbon is a great talent. Many of the Barry fans who were at the Welshpool match at Jenner Park in February will recall Luke's cool head to take THAT penalty 8 minutes into injury time, to give Barry Town their first win of the season. Storming away to a 4-1 landslide, Barry Town crumbled to 4-4 deep into injury time when the shock penalty was awarded. Luke also scored a cracking goal from the most acute of angles in Barry's last day 3-1 victory over Port Talbot Town.

A special award went to Ian Johnson (or to those in the know; 'MLYD') for his efforts in compiling possibly the best football programme in the Welsh Premier League bar none, being WebMaster of the official Barry Town website, providing news reports and match reports and stats to the local and national press, having a half decent voice for chanting, for sterling efforts in putting money over the bar in the social club, and for opening up a Supporters Club branch in Patagonia, Argentina this summer. Despite this mini Empire, MLYD will no doubt return to the Barry Town fold in the Autumn to see all his good work over the past decade completely undone! MLYD also found infamy in becoming the 7th member of the G6, but when it was found that that didn't sound right, he left.

Karen, Ann and Erika picked up lovely Barry Town coloured flowers from Helen for all their often unappreciated efforts throughout the year. As well as running the Junior Dragons scheme, they're often to be found selling raffle tickets, goalden goals, Player of the Year Awards tickets, chasing up people whose Supporters Club membership has lapsed, or organising and helping out at various Barry Town Supporters Club events, such as Player of the Year Awards in which they were very helpful in pointing me to the 2003 Champions League Final programme when I'd actually picked up the bottle of claret. Good work!

A special award also went to club chairman, Stuart Lovering, as a way of a thank you from the supporters of Barry Town AFC for stepping in and saving the club from almost certain extinction at the end of last year. Warm applause all round! Stuart has an unenviable job of putting Barry Town AFC back on the football map after our famous demise. There are some big plans afoot, but Stuart has made everybody aware that this will only come if the money is available. A bit of a break from recent past traditions then.

Club Secretary and ex-member of the G6 Dave Cole picked up awards for his efforts as part of the G6, as club secretary, club compere, and as being Saturday's tannoy boy. With Dave's dulcit tones and natty use of cleverly arranged pre-match music (!), Saturday's just wouldn't be the same without DJ Coley on the decks. He's done it on European nights as well, 'spinning his wheel' for the likes of FC Porto and Dinamo Kiev.

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There was certainly a different feel to this year's supporters awards than that of last year. For one, last year we had our pro players and had just won an incredible 3rd title in a row - with a Welsh Cup Final victory only a week away too. We were on the crest of a wave and looking forward to Europe, with ex-chairman Kevin Green talking about how the 'good' club he'd bought a few years before had now become a 'great' club. Unfortunately, it was soon to turn into a 'skint' club. A year had passed since then, and players, managers and owner were all new faces - same fans though! Nevertheless, it was enjoyable evening, particularly coming on the back of a terrific victory over a decent Port Talbot side the afternoon before, and a collective sigh of relief that the 2003-04 was now simply Barry Town history. A stirring speech by Director of Football Colin Addison helped everybody believe that next season could well be a season worth looking forward too. CAN'T WAIT.

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