Last night, 92 players, staff, parents, management and guests came together to celebrate both the Men's and Women's first teams season in 2024/2025, and with both teams finishing in their highest every positions, there was definitely cause to celebrate.

The night began with welcome drinks followed by a lovely two course meal brilliantly prepared by our catering manager Bub, and served by Shellie and Hayley.

After food, began the speech and awards part of the evening, and Chairman Andrew Long began the proceedings with a welcome and thank you speech, thanking both teams and management teams for their determination over the course of a very up and down season.

Alicja Holland CEO then took the mic, and echoed the words of Andrew and told the room of how proud she is to be a part of the AFC Sudbury Family.

The first award was the Clubman of the year award and was given to John Smith, who unfortunately wasn't available last night, but will be presented to John at a later date.

Danny Laws made a quick speech thanking his players and management team, and asked the fans to keep up their fantastic support as they look to build on last season for next season.

Then we got to the Men's Awards:

Men's Manager's player of the season: James Bradbrook. Trophy presented by General Manager Dave Hennessey
Men's Players' player of the season: Myles Cowling. Trophy presented by Men's Captain Jake Turner.

In Jake Turner's speech he also took a moment to thank Paige Flemming, Jordan Beale, Isaac Mennie and Will Phillips for their contributions to the Men's first team this season.

Then, it was the Women's turn to give out some awards.

Women's Manager's player of the season: Ellie Rossiter. Trophy presented by Manager Luke Mallett
Women's Players' player of the season: Eva Frazzoni. Trophy presented by Assistant Manager Stefan Mallett

Adrian Goodwin then took to the front and presented the Emma Holloway Award for all round contribution to the Women's first team to Media Manager Ashley Webb.

Supporters' club awards.

Women's Supporters' Player of the season: Sophie Jefferey. Presented by Ashley Webb
Men's Supporter Player of the season: Tom Dickens. Presented by John Crosbie
Supporters Club Merit award: Matt Smith. Presented by John Crosbie

Women's Players' player Eva Frazzoni along with a few players made their thanks, giving out presents to Luke Mallet, Stefan Mallett, Nathan Dabbs and Reggie Lambe (Management team), Ashley Webb and Isaac Mennie (Media Team), Nick Flexman and Daniel Williams (Photographers) and the "Big Boss" Adrian Goodwin.

Andrew Long concluded the speeches with a cheque to Danny Laws which was money raised by Keith Neville and the Vice Presidents club towards the academy's tour to Florida, which they fly off to on Thursday.

The rest of the evening saw our musician for the night, Jason Rampling perform a fantastic set of music, followed by some random karaoke numbers from the Men and Women's first teams.

An absolute honour to be part of another fantastic season at AFC Sudbury, next season we will look to be better on and off the pitch. A massive thanks once again to Bub and her catering team, to Alicja, John Crosbie, Steph Hawkins for helping me organise the hall most of Saturday, Ben Lawrence and Shellie for their hard work behind the bar last night. And finally, a huge personal thank you from me to Helene Jones, who's worked hard behind the bar, not just last night, but the whole season.

Up the Suds.

Ash Webb