St Jacques recently celebrated their very successful first season in the Hampshire league structure with their end of season awards ceremony, held at La Grande Mare Hotel.

Throughout the season there were some very consistent and notable individual performances from various players, but none more so then from centre Airy Cleere. And it was the Irishman who scooped the main Players Player award at the end of the evening having been comprehensively voted for by his fellow players.

However Cleere was not the only Irishman to be rewarded for his performances last season, as fly-half Conor Murtagh picked up two awards himself. The classy no 10 was excellent throughout last season and one of the key players in Jon Bell’s squad, and he was duly rewarded with the the Player of the Year and Best Newcomer awards. The quiet unassuming man was clearly quite shocked to win either award, but was fully deserving of both accolades. He will remain an important part of Bell’s squad next season and his coach will hope he can continue to produce his performance levels of last season come September.

Tom Chammings was another player to excel for the black and yellows last season, and the university bound fullback was rewarded for his performances with two awards. The young man collected the Young player of the year award along with the coveted Coaches player of the year. Jon Bell said in awarding his coaches award that Chammings showed great maturity well above his years last season along with excellent versatility, as he played much of the latter part of the season at Fly-half and continued to excel, with Murtagh either unavailable or playing at scrum half, and he will be a player whom St Jacques will miss next season.

Chairman Stefan Bampton was rewarded for his tireless work and commitment to the club with the Jeff Guilbert trophy, which is awarded by the current club president. The stalwart was absent for the dinner as he was attending his daughters graduation ceremony, but President Chris Griffiths said gave a rousing speech and said that Stefan was truly deserving of the award for his tireless work throughout the club for many years, with much of his work behind the scenes going unseen. It was a particularly moving moment and although Bampton was unable to collect the award himself, it was caught on video and Jon Bell received it on his behalf to a standing ovation.

Alex Penney and Airy Cleere jointly collected the Most Improved player award, Hayden Dempsey collected the 2nd Team/Development Team player of year award and Rachel Merrien also collected the Supporter of the year trophy for her excellent support of the club, both in Guernsey and in the UK last season.

After the awards Head Coach Jon Bell said that it was a great evening and a deserved opportunity to celebrate last seasons success.

“Tonight was a real chance to celebrate our hard work last season. We never believed at the start of last season we would win the league in our first season playing in Hampshire, but the talent of our squad and hard work was enough for us to do that. Now we must get back to working hard in preparation for the next season. We want to really develop the entire squad this coming season whilst building on from our success last season.”

“We would welcome any new players to the club, if you are new to the island, previously played rugby locally or even if you have not played rugby before but want to get involved. We have several lads such as Piers Ockleford who had never played rugby before who have taken up the sport and have picked it up very quickly and are doing really well. St Jacques has a real community feel about it and is more then just about rugby”If any new players would be interested in joining the club please contact the club for details regarding training. Contact details can be found on their website www.pitchero.com/clubs/stjacquesrfc.

Award Winners

Players Player: Airy Cleere
Player of the Year: Conor Murtagh
Coaches Player: Tom Chammings
Young Player: Tom Chammings
Best Newcomer: Conor Murtagh
Most Improved: Alex Penney/Airy Cleere
2nd Team/Dev Player: Hayden Dempsey
Supporter of the Year: Rachel Merrien