GUISBOROUGH Town held their annual ‘Player of the Year’ Awards night at the Priory Suite in the KGV Stadium on Saturday with some well-deserved accolades going to players who have excelled throughout the season.

On a special night which had a horse racing theme for the first time – in keeping with the Grand National held earlier in the day - Guisborough born-and-thoroughbred Mark Robinson won what is widely regarded as the top honour of the night, the ‘Supporters Player of the Year Award’. Robinson was absolutely delighted to be voted the supporters’ favourite. “It’s a great honour,” he said, “It means an awful lot to me for the fans to vote me their Number One.”

In the senior team, Mason McNeill was voted Players’ player of the year and Brian Close the Manager’s player of the year. The CLS young player of the year was Charlie Marshall. In the reserve team, Matt Bashir was nominated as reserve team player of the year, the top goal scorer was John Howard and the reserves players’ player of the year was Josh Trindle. Marc Yafano, Reserve Team Manager, commented, “Many of our young players have had an outstanding year and I am proud that we are creating a really good conveyor belt of talent to step up to the first team, which has been amply demonstrated by young players such as Charlie Marshall and John Howard.”

Guisborough as a club has always prided itself on how important it sees its young development and reserve side players, and awards were made to the club’s younger players in the under 19s. The top goal scorer was Dom Harrison and Jake Ward was nominated as their players’ player of the year. Theo Southall was the U19s Manager Player of the Year.

A special award was presented by First Team player Lee Bythway to the first team kit man Wilf Forster. Wilf is finally retiring after a lifetime of highly distinguished service across the Teesside football scene. Lee commented, “We wanted to show our appreciation to Wilf for all that he has done for us over the last few years. He has worked very hard for the club.” Wilf replied, “It has been a real pleasure to be associated with this wonderful club, and I will always keep coming down to support Guisborough Town in whatever way I can. It’s a fantastic club with great supporters” .

Guisborough Town Chairman Don Cowan said, “This club can’t function without its supporters and those wonderful volunteers without whom this club wouldn’t prosper as it does do. We already know that next season will be a real challenge with changes afoot in the new Step 4 level that will come into existence. But we have a fantastic set up here and we have great potential to grow this club further.”

“We have got some big ideas and plans which we hope to embed further into our setup here at the KGV,” added Don, who also made special mention of the great support the club receives from CLS and some of its staff which has result in a KGV pitch which, despite a long season, still looks great and is simply “as good as it gets.”