Soccer: New winners at football awards

APNZ

1 Jun, 2012 01:25 AM4 mins to read

All White Winston Reid. Photo / NZ Herald

Winston Reid and Hannah Wilkinson collected multiple honours as Ali Riley and Chris Wood set new records at New Zealand Football's 2011 awards dinner in Hamilton last night.

West Ham's Reid, who was ruled out of the All Whites quest to defend their OFC Nations Cup title with a groin injury, picked up the men's player of the year - voted by a cross-section of the football community - and the inaugural NZPFA player's player of the year award - as voted by his teammates.

Swedish-based Riley extended her dominance of the women's player of the year award winning that category for the fifth time - and fourth in succession - after a WPS-winning season in the USA.

However, Riley and her teammates voted defender Abby Erceg the inaugural Football Ferns players' player of the year, recognising her importance to the team in their World Cup year.

Chris Wood's scoring exploits in the English Championship and League One throughout 2011 saw the former Hamiltonian become the first person to win three young men's player of the year titles, adding another plaque to those won for the 2008 and 2009 calendar years.

The biggest haul of awards went to Hannah Wilkinson who collected three gongs; the young women's player of the year and both the ASB Women's League's player of the year and golden boot trophies following a record scoring effort on the domestic front and a breakthrough year with the national team.

The Young All Whites, who progressed to the knockout stages of the Fifa under-17 World Cup in Mexico, were resounding winners of the team of the year award, and Auckland City's dominance at domestic level in 2011 was recognised with Ramon Tribulietx winning coach of the year.

A new community-focused set of awards saw four winners recognised for their positive impact at the grassroots.

Napier City Rovers was recognised with the All Whites community impact award for a community based programme delivered to nearly 7000 children in the Hawke's Bay.

Wellington's Island Bay United received the commercial partnership award for building relationships with Capital Football and the Wellington City Council that resulted in a new artificial turf at Wakefield Park.

The tireless work of Caroline Mason in smoothing the way for a merger between Cashmere Wanderers and Woolston Technical to form Cashmere Technical was recognised with the volunteer of the year award while the big community award - the ASB Whole of Football Club of the Year -went to Pukekohe for their best practice implementation of the new junior framework initiatives.

The time period covered by the awards is the 2011 calendar year with the exception of the 2011/12 ASB Premiership and ASB Women's League awards.