Keith presents the sports awards.
THIS ISLAND LIFE
IN recent years the Island has produced a steady stream of sports performers who have gone on to make a name for themselves on the international stage.
People such as swimmer Darren Mew, heptathlete Kelly Sotherton, former national table-tennis champion Carl Prean and the country’s pre-eminent hammer-thrower, Andy Frost, immediately spring to mind.
This coming summer three Island lads — David Griffiths, Chris Russell and Danny Briggs — will playing cricket at county level and Briggs has already become a regular in the England Under-19 side.
This level of achievement should be a source of immense pride to all Islanders, because, for many years immediately after the last war, this place was a sporting backwater.
We managed to produce the odd footballer, such as Roy Shiner and Keith Allen, who established themselves in the professional game.
Then there was Jonathan Griffiths, who cut his rugby teeth with the Hurricanes and went on to play for Wales.
But these men were a success despite the Island, not because of it. They had a natural talent which would not be denied, which was just as well because a decent coaching infrastructure was just a distant dream in those days.
But much has changed in the past 25 years or so. Facilities, especially for swimming, cricket, athletics, ice hockey and rowing, have gradually been developed and improved.
We are producing an increasing number of talented and dedicated coaches in many sports and at all levels.
This means young Islanders who display a smattering of ability are given the opportunity to develop it and a growing number are rising to the challenge.
That’s why the Riverside Centre was such an intoxicating and enjoyable place to be the other evening, when it played host to the IW Sports and Recreation Council’s annual sports achievement awards.
The backroom workers — the people without whom sport simply would not exist at a local level — were rightly thanked for their efforts.
But their real reward was seeing a room teeming with young talent, representing an encouragingly wide cross-section of sports.
As well as the more traditional ones mentioned above, there were also young men and women from sports as diverse as synchronised swimming and motorcycle trials riding.
However, they all had one thing in common. Though a little embarrassed at being exposed to the acclaim of a couple of hundred people, they all had that unmistakable air of confidence and determination which marks out the leaders from the led.
I have no intention of adding any undue pressure by naming them at this stage but I confidently predict at least three (and perhaps four) of the youngsters who featured among the nominees will go on to represent their country at a senior level.
And that should be a source of immense pride to us all.
Big, quiet man between the posts
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| Ryde Sports team pictured is: back, left to right, L. Brown, J. Carter, H. Curtis, D. Jolliffe (trainer), T. Wright, P. Brown, G. Stephenson. Front, N. Hobbs, J. Fielon, H. Windeler, D. Williams and H. Ellis. |
THIS photograph brings back so many memories on so many different levels.
It’s the Ryde Sports team, pictured at the old Partlands ground in 1955. I was seven years old at the time and this was probably the first group of players I ever remember watching.
Football old-timers on the Island will recall many of the players, such as Harry Ellis, Lenny Brown, Pat 'Smiler’ Brown and Nobby Hobbs. But it is published today in honour of one man in particular — goalkeeper Harold 'Windy’ Windeler.
Windy, a Ryde Sports’ stalwart for many years, died last week, at the age of 86. Anyone who witnessed his fearless performances would not have been surprised to learn he served as a Royal Marine commando during the last war.
At one stage, he was billeted at Westhill Road, Ryde, where he eventually met his late wife, Marjorie.
She (and the Island) won his heart and he settled here after the war, working for many years as a general builder for G Allen and Sons.
There he met two lifelong pals, Brian McBrearty and the late George Cooke. So close were the three they became known as Foggy, Compo and Clegg, those imperishables from Last of the Summer Wine.
Having been born at Upton Park, Windy was on the verge of a professional football career when he represented West Ham boys and caught the eye of the club’s legendary keeper, Ernie Gregory. But, as was so often the case in those days, the war intervened.
He will be hugely missed by his children, Baden (an old school friend of mine), Margaret and Elizabeth, his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
To me, he will always be the big, quiet man in the roll-neck jumper who seemed to be a permanent fixture between the posts at one of Island football’s finest grounds.