Welcome to the annual Boroondara Sports Awards. This is our opportunity to say thank you, and recognise the hard work that community clubs do to help the health and wellbeing of our community. Through the sacrifice of volunteers, to the hard work of players for those committed to their sport. Together, we do a tremendous amount of good in our community. This year we received 43 submissions, across a wide range of sports that are played in our municipality. From pétanque, to tennis, basketball, to football – all of you make a difference to the health and wellbeing of our community. A club is nothing without its members and its volunteers, who are its beating heart, and it’s to the volunteers that I want to say a special and heartfelt thank you. I’d like to now welcome Nicole Livingstone to present the Boroondara Sports Awards. Nicole is a former Olympian, and the current Head of Women’s Football. Nicole has demonstrated her dedication to sport, which was recognised by an Order of Australia medal in 1997. Thank you very much, Nicole, for joining us today.

Hi, I’m Nicole Livingstone and I’m your host for the annual Boroondara Sports Awards. We’re living in really unusual times and 2020 has certainly thrown us some curve balls. I would have really loved to have met you all at some fancy awards ceremony, but clearly we are not able to do that. However, it shouldn’t stop us from celebrating your remarkable achievements within sport, in your local community. At times of hardship and crisis, we know that sporting clubs play a pivotal role in supporting our communities. They are, and always have been, the heart and soul of our community. As we navigate our way out of COVID, we know that sporting clubs will again become the conduit for our families to reconnect. I’ve spent my life around sporting clubs. As a young person some of my fondest memories are at swim club, and the joy that I experienced is now being translated into my own children through their sporting pursuits, which is exactly what I wanted for them as a parent. Some of my best friends are still those that I grew up with at my local swimming club. These relationships that you’re building, are meaningful and they will stand the test of time, I promise you. The foundation and grounding that I’ve learnt from my community sporting experience, is one that has taught me so much, and has really formed who I am as a person today. Firstly there’s the social interaction, the sense of having to deal with young, old, problem solving – all of the things and skills that you’re able to build, and communication is one that I’ve taken from those days. I’ll take these skills with me, for the rest of my life, this is what my sporting club has taught me. But they’ve also taught me how to be a great athlete, to be good at swimming and have success as an athlete. From my coaches, I learnt what is expected from a work ethic point of view, a dedication and commitment point of view, to make it in my sport of swimming. I was also able to be technically very good at swimming, and they taught me that, to not only swim fast but to also stay injury free. Many of the lessons that I learnt through sport through my community involvement, have certainly stayed with me for the rest of my life, and they’ve enabled me to pursue other areas in my life with the same level of success, as the foundations that I learnt at my sporting club; hard work and discipline. Always remember that your influence matters when it comes to shaping the current and next generations of not only sporting stars, but community stars as well. So I am pleased to be here to celebrate the annual Boroondara Sports Awards program, which recognises the important role that sports clubs play in enhancing community health and wellbeing, increasing participation in physical activity and fostering social connection. These awards about recognising clubs and individuals that provide benefit to the wider community, and engage with non-traditional users. It’s important for you to note that these awards are not just about recognising success from a results perspective on the sporting field. We have six award categories: Inclusive Club of the Year, Collaborative Club of the Year, Young Club Person of the Year, Innovative Club of the Year, Club Person of the Year and the Lifetime Achievement Award. As you can imagine, we have received a lot of interest in these awards, with a total of 43 nominations from 30 individual clubs across those six award categories, so well done for nominating. The first award is the Inclusive Club of the Year Award. It recognises a club that has delivered a program, event or project, which focuses on welcoming and engaging underrepresented groups/communities into the sporting club. Congratulations to the three finalists: Old Scotch Football Club, Camberwell Hockey Club and Camberwell Central Bowls Club. Now I’m going to get you to do a dumb roll at home, you ready? And the winner is: Old Scotch Football Club, for their inclusion initiative resulting in Old Scotch Football Club women and girls, participating and actively involved in a variety of volunteer positions. This has been an exclusive male club for 97 years and since introducing their first women’s team in 2018, women and girls participation at the club continues to thrive and grow each and every year, well done. Many women and girls are now actively involved as team managers, physiotherapists, trainers, and also on the committees with is really important; the general, the social committee members. They’re also coaching and they’ve got other volunteer roles. They strive for an inclusive environment for all members of the community, looking to ensure gender equality. They’re still on the journey to make the club an inspirational environment for the development of young people, both male and female, but they’re well on their way. Congratulations to Old Scotch Football Club. Now to the Innovative Club of the Year. And this award celebrates a club that has delivered a program, event or project, which focuses on providing either a new or a different experience for members, or a new or different way to attract new participants to their club. And the finalists are: Camberwell Hockey Club, Hartwell Tennis Club and Balwyn Park Tennis Club. Congratulations to the three nominees. And the winner is: Camberwell Hockey Club. Congratulations! A truly innovative program, initiated and run by the club, rather than something initiated by Council or State Sporting Association. Its many benefits for the club and participants including physical and mental health. The CHC Summer Masters Competition, which has been running for more than 15 years, is such a great success. This is an internal CHC program held each year over the summer months, since 2003. Participants range in age from 30 to 75 years young, and is continuing to achieve great results and engagement, so congratulations. The third award is the Collaborative Club of the Year Award. This is awarded to a club that has delivered a program, event or project, where a significant effort has been made to partner with the local community, council, organisations or other clubs, for the benefit of the club, or our local community. So, our three finalists are: Deepdene Tennis Club, Balwyn Park Tennis Club, North Balwyn Tennis Club and Canterbury Tennis Club, Deepdene Uniting Cricket Club and the Kew Football Club. And the winner is: the combined effort of Deepdene Tennis Club, North Balwyn Tennis Club, Balwyn Park Tennis Club and Canterbury Tennis Club – well done. A truly collaborative project involving those four Boroondara tennis clubs. They’ve demonstrated a long term successful program, with ongoing social benefits to the community. The clubs have been conducting weekly Friday night social tennis club nights, using the Fast4 format, and it’s been working beautifully. The clubs rotate hosting the social tennis nights, which are open to anyone, especially non-members like me, for the cost of just a gold coin donation. That’s just tremendous. By combining four clubs, they have been able to pull enough weight and enough people together, to be able to make a night of it, and the social night suppers afterwards always allow everybody to share ideas, events and issues. So well done, not only on the Fast4, but the social connection as well – congratulations. Now let’s go to the Club Person of the Year. This recognises a volunteer or club representative over the age of 18, who goes above and beyond their duties and adds remarkable value to the sporting club. There are again three finalists, let’s take a look: from the Kew Cricket Club - Ben Smith, from the Trinity Willison Cricket Club - Jimmy McCaffrey, and from the Camberwell Petanque Club - John-Paul Ernst. Congratulations to all of the finalists. And the winner is: from the Kew Cricket Club - Ben Smith. Our winner initiated and organised a large scale inclusive event with many benefits to the club and our community. Ben is the current secretary of the Kew Cricket Club, a role that he has fulfilled for the last two years, and he’s really passionate about the Kew Cricket Club being a club for all. And to demonstrate that, this year Ben organised a pride round when Kew played against St Bernard’s Cricket Club, and further organised the first Pride Cup game in conjunction with Pride Cup Australia. He also organised key note speakers to come to the club, to speak to the players and volunteers around the issues of inclusivity, tolerance and respect. Well done Ben, great work! Our second to last award is the Young Club Person of the Year. This award is awarded to a volunteer or club representative under the age of 18, who goes above and beyond their duties and adds a remarkable value to their sporting club. And the three nominees are: representing the Camberwell Junior Football Club - Liam Foldi, from the Camberwell Hockey Club - Eliza Roxborough-Judd and from the Kew Comets Junior Football Club - Nicola Xenos. Congratulations to all of you. And the winner is: Liam Foldi. An impressive initiative from a young man at just 17 years of age, making a significant difference to women's opportunities. He organised a 2019 Mother’s Day fund raising event for the club, and raised a significant amount of money for the cause. The initiative shown to start something new, really does set this nominee apart. Liam shows an incredible passion for making a difference and fundraising in areas such as: female charities and charities looking to uplift women in under privileged areas. Liam is a young social entrepreneur, good on you Liam, who wants to make the world a better place, and that is really admirable. Congratulations, Liam. And our final award is the Lifetime Achievement Award. This award is of considerable significance and it recognises a club member, who has made an impact on the development of a sporting club in the City of Boroondara for over 25 years. We pay tribute to the three nominees who have all demonstrated commitment and passion to their clubs. Firstly, from the Burwood Cricket Club - John Edgar, Camberwell Magpies Cricket Club - Tony Grace and Burwood District Bowls Club - Michael Chittenden. Congratulations to all three of you. This was a very competitive awards category, which made it difficult to choose a winner, so it is my please to announce the winner is: from the Burwood Cricket Club – John Edgar. John has displayed an incredible commitment with his club and boasts an impressive participation and volunteer record at the club. Incredibly, he started his volunteering life as a 9 year old, working the scoreboard at the Burwood Reserve 1967/68 for the senior games – sorry to give up your age there. He began playing the year later and has some pretty impressive stats to his name: 290 senior games, 354 senior wickets and 2,275 senior runs, with the Div 5 competition shield named the ‘JA Edgar’ shield in his honour. Name a role at the club, and John has done it, from committee member to the secretary, vice president and a president role that he’s held now since 2017. John, we congratulate you for your significant service and we are pleased to recognise you with this Lifetime Achievement Award. Well that wraps up the awards section of the Boroondara Annual Sports Awards. Congratulations to all of our winners and our finalists as well. Thank you for allowing me to be part of your awards night, and thank you for the significant contribution that you are making to our community. I’m super proud of you, keep it up. Award trophies and everything that you need to have delivered to you, will be delivered to you very soon. I’d now like to say thank you, goodbye, and as I do I’m going to pass across to Sam and Dani, from the City of Boroondara to close out proceedings. Please make sure that you stay safe and take care of your families.

Thank you for tuning in to our slightly bizarre awards ceremony. We’d really like to thank Nicole for presenting the awards today, and the Mayor for her message. Also just to reiterate that message: such great things that you guys do out there in the community, and how important sports clubs are to the community. We’ve heard so many fantastic stories through the nominations about the different programs, for such a wide range of sports. It really is fantastic that we place such great value on that benefit that you guys bring to the wider community. We look forward to receiving many more award nominations next year, and hosting an awards ceremony as well. We’re also really excited for our up and coming accreditation program, which is due to be released soon. Thanks again for tuning in, and we look forward to seeing you next year.